- BAGHDAD -- The US was last
night locked in a dispute with Iraqi leaders over who should be the country's
president when power is handed over on June 30.
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- The US governor of Iraq, Paul Bremer, and the UN special
envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, insisted the job should go to Adnan Pachachi, an
81-year-old former foreign minister. But the Iraqi governing council demanded
that the largely ceremonial post should go to Sheikh Ghazi Mashal Ajil
al-Yawar, an Arab businessman in his 40s who has criticised the US-led
occupation and who is the council's president.
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- The row threatens to delay the appointment of a new interim
government. A ceremony scheduled for today appeared last night to have
been postponed.
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- On Friday the governing council voted unanimously to
endorse Ayad Allawi, a British-educated neurosurgeon with close links to
the CIA, as the new prime minister - a move that seems to have caught Mr
Brahimi by surprise.
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- At a stormy governing council meeting yesterday, Mr Bremer
bluntly warned members not to hold another vote on who should be the new
president. If they did he would ignore it.
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- "The behaviour of Mr Bremer and Mr Brahimi has been
shameful," Dr Mahmoud Othman, a leading council member told the Guardian.
"It's like being in a dictatorship again. Adnan follows the Americans
around like a puppy. If the Americans told Adnan that yoghurt was black,
he would go along with it."
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- Yesterday the coalition's spokesman, Dan Senor, denied
that the US favoured Mr Pachachi. "We are not urging any one candidate,"
he said.
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- Mr Bremer's tough stance in support of Mr Pachachi, a
former exile who served as Iraq's foreign minister before the Ba'ath party
seized power in 1968, was unexpected. The Americans had previously indicated
that they were primarily interested in approving the choice for prime minister.
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- The governing council is due to meet again today, amid
rumours that a mystery third candidate could emerge.
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- Council members admitted that the row was the main stumbling
block to an agreement on the entire cabinet, due to be unveiled this week,
which will hold power until Iraqi elections next January.
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- The bickering has done little to help the new government's
credibility. "The people were never involved in the political process
for 35 years. So what's new," Kareem Mahmoud, a Baghdad street vendor
said.
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- Sheikh Ghazi took over as head of the governing council
earlier this month after the assassination of his predecessor, Izzedin
Salim.
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- Both he and Mr Pachachi are Sunni Arabs. But while Mr
Pachachi wears western suits, Sheikh Ghazi dresses in traditional Arab
robes and headgear.
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- Yesterday a source close to Sheikh Ghazi said Mr Bremer
and Mr Brahimi asked him to step down in favour of Mr Pachachi. He was
apparently offered the post of cabinet spokesman or ambassador in Washington.
The sheikh told them to seek the governing council's opinion.
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- In a recent television interview, he blamed America for
Iraq's problems. "They occupied the country, disbanded the security
agencies and for 10 months left Iraq's borders open for anyone to come
in without a visa or passport."
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- Mr Pachachi fled to the United Arab Emirates after the
Ba'ath party seized power. He is well connected with the US, and pro-US
states in the Gulf.
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- Last night senior Iraqi politicians admitted that despite
Mr Brahimi's promise to bring in "non-political" faces and technocrats,
the new Iraqi government looked suspiciously like the old one. "The
difference this time is that it does have powers and will have international
recognition," Dr Othman admitted.
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- "Until there are elections, no government can really
lay claim to credibility."
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- - Masked gunmen ambushed a convoy of armoured vehicles
carrying western civilians in north-west Baghdad last night, killing at
least four Iraqis and abducting three westerners, police said.
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- A Guardian translator who arrived on the scene soon after
the incident said locals were dancing around two burning four-wheel-drive
vehicles, chanting "victory to the Arabs". Police said up to
eight men in Arab dress had fired on the convoy from a bridge.
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- Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited
2004
- http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1228210,00.html
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