Sunni Group Near Deal With Kurds on Iraqi Government

NYT reported The largest Sunni Arab political group in Iraq unexpectedly moved toward agreement with Kurdish leaders Monday on a broad framework for a coalition government. The group, the Iraqi Consensus Front, said it would abandon claims that national elections last month had been rigged once international election monitors finish their review of the allegations. The move drew a rebuke from other Sunni Arab political leaders who accused the Sunni consensus party of violating an agreement to press ahead with claims of Sunni disenfranchisement during the vote on Dec. 15 and to not bargain on their own for a role in the new government.

That would be absolutely stupid for them to ignore an opportunity to get a role in the government and just end up with something to complain about.

"They violated an agreement with us that they will not go alone to talk about the government," Saleh Mutlak, a leader of the Iraqi National Trend, another leading Sunni Arab political group, said Monday night.

They probably should have brought the other Sunni groups along with them, unless it was obvious that the other groups just wanted to bitch, and not participate in the government.

The Sunni consensus party and the Kurds remain far apart on several crucial issues, including one they highlighted at a news conference on Monday: the Kurds support introducing federal states throughout Iraq, while the Sunnis, who fear the loss of revenue from large oil fields in the Shiite-dominated south, want only the Kurds in the north to have a semi-autonomous state.