BAGHDAD, Feb. 14 -- The top vote-getters in Iraq's national elections huddled Monday to bargain over posts in the next government, and Kurdish parties appeared to be in position to install the first president of their ethnic minority in Iraq's history.
The Kurds said they would demand that Jalal Talabani, 72, the longtime leader of one of their two main factions, be named president in return for their support for candidates from other parties for different posts.
Abdul Aziz Hakim, head of the Shiite Muslim coalition that won most votes in Iraq's national elections, speaks to reporters at his headquarters in Baghdad.
(Hadi Mizban -- AP)
|
|
The presidency is largely ceremonial but of great symbolic significance to the Kurds, a mostly Sunni Muslim minority that was oppressed and massacred during Saddam Hussein's rule. Talabani headed a Kurdish militia and remained in Iraq during the Hussein years, unlike many politicians who went into exile and have now returned to take jobs in the government.
The more powerful position of prime minister is likely to go to a candidate from the Shiite Muslim coalition that won 48 percent of the vote on Jan. 30 and may get more than half of the 275 seats in the National Assembly. But because the next prime minister must be approved by two-thirds of the assembly members, the Kurds, who won 26 percent, are in a position to provide that margin.
All of the major parties have proposed a form of national unity government that would include Shiites and Kurds, as well as Sunni Arabs, who largely boycotted the election.
"We believe in the need for participation and will seek harmony among all segments of the Iraqi people," Abdul Aziz Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a leading Shiite party, said on Iraqi television.
The results of the election, announced Sunday, will be made official after the Iraqi elections commission rules on a variety of complaints about voting irregularities. The new assembly is to convene by March 1, and a council consisting of the president and two vice presidents is to nominate a prime minister and cabinet.
There were several insurgent attacks on Monday after a violent weekend. In Baqubah, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, a roadside bomb killed a U.S. soldier and wounded three, according to the military.
In a separate blast in Baqubah, two Iraqi National Guardsmen were killed, according to the Reuters news agency. In Baghdad, two policemen were killed by gunmen firing from a passing car, and three people were injured at a Baghdad police station that came under mortar fire.
Insurgents apparently seeking to cripple the country's economy struck an oil pipeline in northern Iraq. The resulting blaze near the city of Kirkuk could take three days to extinguish, authorities said. Repeated sabotage attacks have caused a decrease in oil exports and the income they generate have angered Iraqis by causing long lines at gas stations.
