Baghdad, Iraq – Iraq’s political parties continued to wrangle over the formation of a new government Tuesday, as the ruling coalition of Shiite religious parties tried to delay the first meeting of parliament, scheduled for Sunday, to have more time to line up support for its nominee for prime minister.
Also Tuesday, the senior British troop commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Nick Houghton, said in an interview with London’s Daily Telegraph that he hoped British troops would be pulled out of Iraq by the summer of 2008, with withdrawals beginning as early as this spring.
U.S. politicians and military officials have avoided setting a timetable for pulling out, saying it could fuel the insurgency.
President Jalal Talabani said Monday that the new National Assembly would have its first meeting on March 12, the deadline set by the constitution.
But leaders of the Shiites’ United Iraqi Alliance, who have the largest bloc in the 275-member parliament elected in December, said they were lobbying Talabani to postpone the first session for perhaps a week.
Iraq’s parliament and government frequently ignore deadlines set by law.
But Iraqi and U.S. officials have warned that delays in forming a government could intensify the factional tensions already gripping the country and might intensify sectarian violence.
Haitham al-Husseini, a spokesman for the leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, one of the largest parties in the Shiite alliance, said the coalition had asked Talabani for the delay and was waiting for his response.
The Shiites nominated transitional Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari to continue in office when the next government is formed.
But al-Jaafari is opposed by Sunni Arab and Kurdish parties in particular for what they see as his lackluster record in taming violence and speeding up reconstruction.
Meanwhile, an Interior Ministry official, who would not be quoted by name, said the slaying Monday of Maj. Gen. Mubdar Hatim Hazya al-Dulaimi, the senior commander of Iraqi troops in Baghdad, was carried out by a sniper who shot the general as he was getting out of his vehicle.
The incident, which is under investigation by Iraq’s army, raised the possibility that the people involved had inside information about al-Dulaimi’s activities.
