BAGHDAD — Iraq’s prime minister lashed out at the country’s Sunni Arab vice president in an interview published Tuesday, drawing attention to a bitter rift between key politicians from rival sects at a time the U.S. is pressing for Iraqi unity.
A U.S. military helicopter, meanwhile, crashed Tuesday near Salman Pak, southeast of Baghdad, killing two soldiers and wounding 12, the military said. It said initial reports indicated the crash was not a result of hostile fire.
In the interview with Al-Hayat, a London-based Arabic-language daily, al-Maliki, a Shiite, said Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi was to blame for a backlog of legislation adopted by parliament but not ratified by the three-man presidential council of which the Sunni is a member. He also said al-Hashemi’s Iraq Accordance Front, the largest Sunni bloc in parliament, was not representative of the Sunni Arab community.
For months, al-Hashemi has been a sharp and outspoken critic of al-Maliki, accusing him of pursuing pro-Shiite sectarian policies and restricting decision-making inside a small circle of top aides from his Dawa party.
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Lawmakers cite scare tactics WASHINGTON — In their latest tussle with the White House on the Iraq war, two leading House Democrats said Tuesday that the Pentagon was using scare tactics to try to goad Congress into passing another war-spending bill.
Reps. David Obey and John Murtha said they won’t budge.
Obey, D-Wis., chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, and Murtha, D-Pa., head of the defense appropriations subcommittee, said they won’t back more money for the war this year unless President Bush accepts a troop-pullout timetable.
Last week, the House passed a $50 billion bill that would keep operations afloat for several more months but sets a goal of bringing most troops home by December 2008. After Bush threatened to veto the measure, Senate Republicans blocked it.
“If the president wants that $50 billion released, all he has to do is to call the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, and ask him to stop blocking it,” Obey told reporters.
Obey and Murtha convened the rare recess-week news conference to counter Pentagon reports that the military will have to make drastic cuts — including the layoffs of as many as 100,000 civilian employees — if it doesn’t get the money soon.
Anne Flaherty, The Associated Press
