Report: Sadr to end government boycott, meets with Shi'ite coalition this weekend

Nouri al-Maliki, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, Moqtada al-Sadr,
Harith al-Dhari and Massoud Barzani

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has agreed to allow his supporters to go back to their positions in the Iraqi government after a three-week boycott to protest the Iraqi prime minister's meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush, three officials close to the militia leader said late Thursday.

Al-Sadr's loyalists walked out of their positions in parliament and the Cabinet after Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki met Bush in Jordan three weeks ago.

Shiites from the Iraqi parliament's largest bloc, the United Iraqi Alliance, were meeting Thursday in the holy city of Najaf, as part of a plan to persuade the anti-American cleric to persuade the anti-American militia leader to rejoin the political process and rein in his fighters.

They were in touch with al-Sadr's aides, and would meet the cleric himself Friday or Saturday, aides to participants said on condition of anonymity because of the secrecy of talks.

"The main (United Iraqi) Alliance forces and the al-Sadr movement have agreed to solve the problems and overcome the obstacles that made al-Sadr boycott the political process. So within two days, the al-Sadr movement will return to the government and parliament," said Abdul Karim al-Anizi, a prominent Shiite lawmaker from the Dawa faction.

Read the rest at San Jose Mercury News

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