Head of parliament de-Baathification committee rejects draft law

Above: Senior Iraqi military officers at a press conference on March 23, 2003.

BAGHDAD (AP) - The head of the parliament's de-Baathification committee said Friday he will fight a U.S.-backed draft law that would allow former senior members in ousted leader Saddam Hussein 's ruling party to resume government positions.

Falah Hassan Shanshal, a follower of anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, made his comments hours after U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates called Iraqis to pass legislation on political reconciliation that includes amending a so-called de-Baathification law.

The proposal, one of several benchmarks set for the Iraqi government by the U.S. administration, is designed to appease Iraq 's once-dominant Sunni Arab minority in a bid to blunt the country's insurgency and return members of the minority to the political process. The law would allow those in the feared security and paramilitary forces to resume government positions but would exclude former regime members already charged with or sought for crimes.

Read the rest at AOL News

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