finances: Shiite-Sunni Talks Start in Iraq

QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, Associated Press Writer
AP Online
01-25-2006
Dateline: BAGHDAD, Iraq

Iraqi soldiers stand behind suspected insurgents who were detained in an early morning raid, Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2006, in Baqouba, 60 kilometers (35 miles) northeast of Baghdad, Iraq. The Desert Lion Brigade of the Iraqi Army raided multiple houses Tuesday morning arresting 23 suspected insurgents, commander of the Brigade, Col. Saman Talabani said. (AP Photo/Mohammed Adnan)

Shiite leaders have begun talks with Sunni and Kurdish politicians on a national unity government, proposing four candidates to be the country's next prime minister, a Shiite official said Wednesday.

The talks come amid a spate of sectarian violence that threatens to disrupt the forming of the new government.

A prominent Sunni Arab cleric, Karim Jassim Mohammed, 39, was shot dead Wednesday by police at a checkpoint heading into the northern city of Samarra, said police Capt. Laith Mohammed. A policeman was also gunned down in Baghdad's Sadr City, police said.

An Iraqi television journalist, Mahmoud Zaal, was killed Tuesday while filming intense fighting between U.S. forces and insurgents in the volatile western city of Ramadi, said Thaer Ahmed, deputy director of the Baghdad television station where Zaal worked. The circumstances surrounding his death were not immediately clear.

No details were immediately available from the U.S. military.

The United Iraqi Alliance, the main Shiite bloc in the parliament, started the talks on the new government Tuesday with the Iraqi Accordance Front, a group of prominent Sunni Arab parties, said Shiite lawmaker Baha al-Aaraji.

The alliance suggested four nominees to be the next prime minister in the government to be announced at the end of the negotiations, which could take weeks, said al-Aaraji, a supporter of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and a member of a seven-man committee forming Shiite political policy.

The four include the current premier, Ibrahim al-Jaafari; Adil Abdul-Mahdi of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq; nuclear physicist Hussein al-Shahrastani; and Nadim al-Jabiri of the Fadhila party, a religious group whose spiritual leader is al-Sadr's late father, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr.

Ali al-Adeeb, a senior official from al-Jaafari's Dawa Party, warned against choosing a prime minister who will not listen to the views of other government members.

"We don't want a prime ministerial candidate who decides policies on his own but rather sticks to the alliance's declared policies," said al-Adeeb.

Shiite leaders said the talks with Sunnis have not yet delved into key Sunni concerns, such as provisions in the new constitution to transform Iraq into a federal state and ban key Baathists from government jobs.

Iraq's most powerful Shiite politician, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, has said the Shiites would oppose major concessions on some key Sunni demands.

But Abbas al-Bayati, a Shiite Turkoman member of the Shiite alliance, said his bloc would listen to the Sunni concerns. "We suspect there are demands behind all the criticism," al-Bayati said.

The government negotiations follow heightened tensions in northern Baghdad, particularly the mainly Sunni Arab neighborhood of Toubji, where dozens of armed men dressed in Interior Ministry police uniforms killed three Sunni males and abducted more than 20 on Monday.

Sunni religious and political leaders have blamed Shiite-backed security services for the incident, demanding government action and urging Sunnis to defend themselves against future attacks.

There was no word, meanwhile, on the fate of two male German engineers kidnapped Tuesday near Beiji, 155 miles north of Baghdad, by gunmen wearing military uniforms.

The fate of American journalist Jill Carroll, who was kidnapped Jan. 7 in Baghdad, also remains unknown. Carroll's kidnappers have demanded U.S. forces release all Iraqi women in their custody or they will kill the 28-year-old American. Iraq's Justice Ministry, which coordinates with the Americans on releases, said six of the nine women in detention would be freed this week, possibly Thursday.

The U.S. military said the cases of several female Iraqi detainees had been reviewed, adding that a batch of Iraqis in military custody will soon be freed, according to Lt. Col. Guy Rudisill, spokesman for American detainee operations.