Maliki rejects demands of Sunni bloc

Above: The major players -- Nuri al-Maliki (Prime Minister, Shiite), Tariq al-Hashemi (one of two Vice Presidents, Sunni), Moqtada al-Sadr ('fiery' anti-American cleric, Shiite), Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim (head of the largest Shiite coalition), Jalal Talabani (President of Iraq, Kurd, Qadiri Sufi sect of Sunnism), and Massoud Barzani (President of Iraqi Kurdistan, Naqshbandi Sufi sect of Sunnisim). The Sunni bloc just returned to parliament after Mahmud Mashhadani was reinstated as speaker. Sadr's parliamentary bloc also returned recently to the legislature following a protest of the most recent bombing of the al-Askari shrine in Samarra. The U.S. military has said that Sadr is back in Iran, which Sadr's aides are denying.

The Shiite-led Iraqi government issued a sharp response Friday to a Sunni political bloc that is threatening to pull out of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's administration, saying the group's "threatening, pressuring and blackmail" cannot impede Iraq's progress.

In a four-page written statement, Maliki spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh dismissed each of 11 demands made by the Accordance Front, Iraq's largest Sunni political group. Dabbagh accused the Accordance Front of working for its own political gains rather than for the benefit of the Iraqi people.

"The threatening, pressuring and blackmail is useless, and delaying the work of the government, the Council of Representatives and the political process will not bring Iraq back to the time of dictatorship and slavery," Dabbagh wrote.

The Accordance Front announced Wednesday that its six ministers in Maliki's cabinet will quit the government permanently unless the prime minister makes significant progress on its list of demands by next week.

Read the rest at the Washington Post

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