Senior Iraqi politician says Bush interfering in selection of govt. head

[bigtree]

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A senior Iraqi politician from a rival Shi'ite party to Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said on Tuesday that U.S. President George W. Bush had made clear he did not want Jaafari to lead a new government of national unity.

Bush had written to Shi'ite leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim urging him to nominate someone else, Rida Jawad al-Takki, an aide to Hakim, said in a statement telephoned to Reuters.

Takki said the letter was transmitted by U.S. ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, who has been trying to broker agreement among Shi'ite, Kurdish and Sunni Arab leaders on a unity government.

"George Bush sent a letter via Khalilzad to Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, as head of the Alliance, telling him that George Bush does not wish or want Ibrahim al-Jaafari to be prime minister," Takki, who is from Hakim's SCIRI party, said.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. embassy said she was unaware of such a communication and said it was not U.S. policy to interfere in the process of forming a government: "This is an Iraqi decision," she said.

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-03-28T134117Z_01_MAC837810_RTRUKOC_0_US-IRAQ-USA-JAAFARI.xml&archived=False


I'll bet he wants to re-install Allawi who got only about 17% of the vote.

[rox63]

1. Never mind that inconvenient 'democracy' thingy... n/t

:banghead:

[Roland99]

2. Bush Stumbles Over Sovereignty

http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/bushvideos/v/bushismtribal.htm

"Tribal sovereignty means that; it's sovereign. I mean, you're a — you've been given sovereignty, and you're viewed as a sovereign entity. And therefore the relationship between the federal government and tribes is one between sovereign entities." —President Bush, Washington, D.C., Aug. 6, 2004

[NNN0LHI]

3. al-Jaafari lived in the USA for twenty years. He ain't no Iraqi

Bush is trying to provide him political cover is all. If we leave al-Jaafari will have his head cut off along with the rest of the puppets Bush installed in Iraq.

Don

[Dhalgren]

5. Right now it seems as though the Shiites want Jaafari,

and the Shiites are going to get what they want...

[NNN0LHI]

6. Yea, they want to cut his head off. They know he is a US puppet

We ain't kidding nobody here except for some gullible Americans who will believe anything you tell them.

Don

[Dhalgren]

7. So the reports coming from Juan Cole and others that say the

group of Shiite parties who will control the new legislature (if it ever forms) are sticking together and demanding the Jaafari be PM are not true? Or is there some behind the scenes thing going on in this matter? Seriously, of all of the reports I've seen from Iraq, the Shiites support Jaafari; where do you get the idea that the majority of Shiites want Jaafari dead? This is a very interesting idea, but I don't "get" it. TIA...

[NNN0LHI]

9. Is what I am saying is that Bush would have never shipped in...

...an 'unknown quantity' all the way from the USA or Britain to run for the position of running Iraq. Its like a game of Three Card Monty. If you rig the game from the beginning you can't lose. Bush did the same thing in Afghanistan by the way. If you want to believe differently I am not going to argue with you. Take care and see you layer.

Don

[bigtree]

10. Hey NNN0LHI,

I think Jaafari, and the Shiites in general, represent an obstacle to Bush's consolodation of power there because of their alliances with Iran, as well as the relationship with Sadr as Dhalgren pointed out. I've thought from the first election that Bush would look for some way to muddle the Shiite majority, despite the appearance he gave of satisfaction with the outcome. No one can believe that the Bush regime is sanguine about handing over Iraq to the same folks we spent years using Saddam as a buffer against. I'm betting on Allawi emerging as their horse. Two articles I found show that they intend to create a new 'National Security Council' with Allawi at the head. It's supposed to dilute the Shiite influence as a 'parallel authority'. Check it out.

[NNN0LHI]

13. Would Bush allow Jaafari to live in the Green Zone if he didn't like him

The US is in charge of who is allowed to come and go there. Bush could put him on the next plane out of Iraq if he wants to. Jaafari knows this too. So Jaafari pretty much has to do what he is told to do. Don't you agree?


Don

[Dhalgren]

11. I am not trying to argue with you or be negative in any way.

I had just not heard this about Jaafari before and I wondered where you got your information. I have not been able to find any citation of a very pro-US Jaafari connection. Here's a bio from Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibrahim_al-Jaafari


"Dr. Ibrahim al-Ashaiqir al-Jaafari (Arabic: إبراهيم الأشيقر الجعفري) (born 1947) is the Prime Minister of Iraq in the Iraqi Transitional Government following the elections of January 2005. He is a Shiite and was previously one of the two vice-presidents of Iraq under the Iraqi Interim Government in 2004, and the main spokesman for the Islamic Dawa Party in Iraq.

He was born Ibrahim al-Ashaiqir (إبراهيم الأشيقر) in Karbala and was educated at Mosul university as a medical doctor. He joined the Islamic Dawa Party in 1968. Upon graduation from school in 1974 he worked actively for the party in Iraq which was trying to overthrow a Ba'athist secular government. He left for Iran in 1980 and became involved in the movement against Saddam Hussein there. He moved to London in 1989 where he became the al-Dawa spokesman in the UK and an important participant in the wider anti-Saddam movement. While in the UK he attended many Iraqi Events giving religious sermons."

I am not saying that Jaafari is not pro-US and a puppet, he very well may be. All I am asking is where did you get this information and would you share it? I am simply interested...

[NNN0LHI]

12. My mistake. It was Britain not the USA where he was living

I still stand by my assertion that Bush wasn't going to ship into Iraq someone who he wasn't sure was going to play ball. He lives in the Green Zone under US protection. I would think that if his fellow Shiites liked him so much they would provide for his security.

Don

[Dhalgren]

8. Here is just an example from Juan Cole of what appears to be

Shiite support for Jaafari...

"The Badr Organization, a political party that represents the paramilitary Badr Corps, the Shiite militia of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, demanded Monday that Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador to Iraq, be expelled from that country.

This moment is therefore a particularly inauspicious one for Khalilzad to press for the sidelining of Ibrahim Jaafari as candidate for prime minister of the United Iraqi Alliance. Jaafari narrowly won an internal party vote, but was backed by Muqtada al-Sadr and opposes loose federalism and unrestrained capitalism. For all these reasons he is unacceptable to the Kurds and to the US."

www.juancole.com

:shrug:

[ugarte]

4. But...but...what about all those purple fingers?

Iraqis, you've been punked.

:rofl:

[bigtree]

14. Scotty getting a string of questions on this from Sanger of the NYT