Iraqi Prime Minister Promises Government Shake-Up

Aftermath of a bus bombing in Baghdad today, which killed at least 10.

BAGHDAD, Nov. 12 — Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said Sunday that he was planning a major shake-up of his cabinet, apparently to redress his six-month-old government’s failure to curb widespread corruption, reduce sectarian violence and improve public services.

Speaking to a closed session of Parliament, Mr. Maliki suggested that some of his ministers were incompetent but said he had been forced to accept his cabinet under pressure from the country’s major political blocs, according to several legislators. The prime minister asked for more independence in choosing new cabinet members.

The parliamentary session came on a day when at least 100 people were found dead or were reported killed in mayhem throughout the country. In one attack, two suicide bombers detonated themselves outside a police recruitment center in Baghdad, killing at least 35 potential recruits and wounding at least 56, the police said. Military officials reported that four British soldiers and three American soldiers died in attacks in Anbar and Basra provinces.

During the parliamentary session, Mr. Maliki did not disclose which ministers he planned to replace. But legislators close to the prime minister said he did not intend to change the political distribution of the cabinet seats. Mr. Maliki’s cabinet is mostly Shiite, but includes representatives of Iraq’s other main ethnic and sectarian communities.

The proposed shake-up, coming as the Bush administration has begun a major reassessment of U.S. policy in Iraq, appeared to be an effort both to curry American favor and to placate Mr. Maliki’s domestic detractors, including Sunni Arab leaders demanding a greater role in government and more action against Shiite militias accused of spawning death squads.

The Maliki administration has been facing mounting criticism from American officials and some Iraqi leaders impatient with the prime minister’s inability — or unwillingness — to disarm militias, particularly those linked to the most powerful Shiite parties that form the basis of his ruling political alliance. Mr. Maliki has been so concerned about growing American disenchantment that last month he sought, and received, assurances from President Bush that the United States was not plotting to unseat him.

Several months ago, Mr. Maliki expressed his intention to replace several of his 36 ministers, but Sunday’s announcement suggested far more sweeping changes that, according to some legislators, could involve more than half of the cabinet.

Mr. Maliki was nominated as prime minister on April 21 and his full cabinet was ratified by Parliament on May 20. But he told legislators on Sunday that he was essentially sidelined by the major political blocs during the ministerial selection process. In some cases, he said, a minister’s name was presented to him only minutes before the nomination was made public.

Read the rest at the NY Times

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