Parliament session delayed till Saturday as Shiites mull next move
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraqi lawmakers decided to postpone a parliament session set for Thursday till Saturday amid a possible breakthrough over the contentious issue of the prime minister's post.
Acting speaker Adnan Pachachi said the delay will help politicians succeed in forming a national unity government, a sought-after but elusive goal.
Lawmakers are formulating a list of candidates for president, prime minister and parliament speaker. Transitional President Jalal Talabani said an agreement is in the works and "the deal that we have will please everybody."
The move comes after Ibrahim al-Jaafari -- whose nomination as prime minister has paralyzed Iraq's political process -- signaled to his Shiite political bloc Thursday that it could pick another candidate for the job.
The Shiite coalition is rethinking the nomination to get the gears of government moving.
They asked the parliament to delay Thursday's session so they could resolve the issue over al-Jaafari, who has softened his stance after insisting for many weeks he wouldn't step aside.
Al-Jaafari wrote the Shiite-led United Iraqi Alliance a letter that says, in effect, the group needs to decide whether to keep him or choose someone else.
The country's transitional prime minister, al-Jaafari has been a polarizing figure since alliance members nominated him two months ago.
He earned the nomination by one vote, pushed over the top by supporters of firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
His selection generated opposition from Sunnis, Kurds and secularists -- all of whom criticized his job performance -- and it created a stalemate in the formation of a national unity government.
The failure to form a government has created a political vacuum more than four months after Iraqis went to the polls to elect a parliament.
U.S. and British officials have warned bickering politicians that they must put aside differences to tame the escalating Sunni-Shiite sectarian violence.
Hostilities between Shiites and Sunnis have been inflamed since the February 22 bombing of Al-Askariya Mosque, a revered Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad.
Other developments
- A U.S. military official on Thursday emphasized that terrorist suspect Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and al Qaeda in Iraq remain the coalition's "primary target" and that "he's the threat that we're focused on." Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch made the observation after recent reports that the Jordanian-born militant has been replaced as the political leader of al Qaeda in Iraq.
CNN's Arwa Damon and Auday Sadek contributed to this report.