An internal United States government report portrays a grim picture of Iraq’s stability, rating six of the country’s 18 provinces as in a ”serious” situation and one ”critical”, it emerged on Sunday.
The US ambassador in Baghdad, Zalmay Khalilzad confirmed the report, which was leaked to the New York Times, but said it marked an improvement on last year. ”If they looked at a similar study a year ago, they would have seen the situation was not as good as it is now,” Khalilzad told CNN. However, the report, a ”provincial stability assessment”, prepared by the US embassy and the US military command, is in marked contrast with the sunnier assessments generally heard from the White House and the Pentagon.
Surfacing on ”Freedom Day”, the third anniversary of the toppling of Saddam Hussein’s statue in Baghdad, the report includes a map showing the western province of Anbar in red for ”critical” and six other provinces including Baghdad and Basra, as orange for ”serious”.
The report comes at a critical moment, with a political vacuum following the December elections while Iraqi parties argue over the formation of a national unity government. Despite pressure from Iraq’s senior Shia cleric to end the damaging political deadlock, Shia leaders failed yet again on Sunday to agree on a new prime minister in spite of two days of meetings.
Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani urged them to choose a government speedily, but in a move which gives some comfort to the caretaker Prime Minister, Ibrahim Jaafari, who wants to stay in his post, the cleric said Shias must work by consensus and maintain their unity. Jaafari won the Shia bloc’s nomination by one vote in February. Adel Abdul Mahdi, his main rival, broke ranks last week and called for him to step down because Sunnis and Kurds refuse to work under him. Other in the seven-party Shia coalition that won the elections also want Jaafari to go.
Jawad al Maliki, an official of Jaafari’s party is part of a three-man Shia team sounding out Sunni, Kurdish and other parties on possible compromises. The Shia block has less than half the seats in Parliament so any new PM will have to link up with Sunni or Kurdish parties, or the secular party which won 25 seats.
The US and Britain have said Iraqis need a national unity government, spanning all groups — a position Jaafari shares. Khalilzad urged patience on Sunday, arguing: ”We want a good government, not a government as soon as possible.”
Britain’s Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, who visited Baghdad last week in a failed bid to end the paralysis, expressed new irritation on Sunday. ”It’s very frustrating because the leaders are taking far too long to form this government,” he said. But he was careful not to go as far as describing recent sectarian violence as the start of civil war. The Iraqi government is demanding ”clarification” from Egypt after President Hosni Mubarak told a TV channel ”Iraq is almost close to destruction”.
Two German engineers held hostage since January were threatened with death on Sunday unless the US releases its prisoners in Iraq. Thomas Nitzschke and Rene Braeunlich were shown in a video in front of a banner of the Supporters of the Sunna and Tawhid group. – Guardian Unlimited Â