Maliki abandoned by own party in his bid to keep power in Iraq

Washington: Iraqi caretaker Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s effort to remain in office was repudiated by his own political bloc, leaving him isolated after a similar rejection by the US, Iran and Iraq’s top Shiite cleric.

As his support crumbled, Maliki has denounced as unconstitutional President Fouad Masoum’s naming of Haidar al-Abadi, a member of Maliki’s Shiite Dawa Party, to replace him as premier.

The Dawa Party on Wednesday urged the nation’s political leaders to abandon Maliki and cooperate with Abadi after party officials sought guidance from Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

His eminence sees a necessity in choosing a new prime minister with a broad national support, according to an e- mailed Dawa Party statement.

The political standoff between Masoum and Maliki, following inconclusive April elections, has exacerbated a power vacuum and hindered efforts to counter the Islamic State insurgents who have seized large parts of Iraq since June.

Abadi, who was born in 1952, has until mid-September to form a cabinet for what the US says should be an inclusive government that can turn back the sectarian actions by Maliki that fuelled a Sunni revolt and Kurdish threats of independence for their Kurdistan region.

US, Iran

Abadi’s nomination has had the unusual effect of drawing support both from the US and from neighbouring Iran, which has major influence with Iraq’s Shiites and funds Shiite militia groups.

In northern Iraq, Kurdish peshmerga troops, bolstered by recent US airstrikes, fought Sunni militants near the town of Sinjar, according to Nineveh provincial council member Hisham al-Brefkani. “Kurdish forces are fighting to retake all the bases the peshmerga lost or used to control,” Brefkani said by phone from Erbil, the capital of the Kurdish region.

“The Kurds’ objectives include the strategic Mosul dam, Iraq’s largest,” he said.

Their push came as the UK and France said they would join the US in supplying the Kurds with weapons, and as the US and Britain considered rescuing civilians trapped by the Sunni insurgents on Sinjar Mountain in northern Iraq.

US troops flew to the mountain yesterday to assess a potential military rescue mission for the Yezidis, a religious minority threatened with death as apostates by the Islamic State group. The troops found fewer trapped civilians than expected, making it far less likely that the US will conduct a rescue, US defence secretary Chuck Hagel told reporters at Andrews Air Force base near Washington.

Mountain visit

The troops are among 129 US military advisers dispatched to the region by President Barack Obama.

In Baghdad, Abadi moved ahead with efforts to form a new cabinet, calling for candidates for ministerial portfolios, he said on his Facebook page.

The European Union, the Arab League, and countries including Egypt and Saudi Arabia also have backed Abadi’s nomination.

‘Step aside’

Maliki’s Shiite-dominated government has for years alienated minority Sunnis, some of whom have backed the Islamic State insurgency.

This government will continue and will not be changed until a federal court decision is made, Maliki said in a television address on Wednesday.

While Maliki vowed a legal fight, his options seemed to narrow by the hour.

“The only person that thinks Maliki should stay in power is Nouri al-Maliki,” Michael Stephens, deputy director of the Royal United Services Institute in Qatar, said in a phone interview. “The Iranians have withdrawn their support from him. The Americans have withdrawn their support from him. I’m not sure what he needs to get in order to understand that he really should probably step aside.” Bloomberg