http://www.juancole.com/2007/06/sunni-bloc-pulls-out-of-government-5-us.html
Saturday, June 30, 2007 Informed Comment
Sunni Bloc Pulls out of Government
The Iraqi Accord Front, the Sunni fundamentalist bloc with 44 seats in parliament, says that it is withdrawing its 6 cabinet ministers from the national unity government of PM Nuri al-Maliki.
The whole concept of a 'national unity government' as thought up by then US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and Iraqi president Jalal Talabani in spring of 2006 has now more or less fallen apart. The Shiite United Iraqi Alliance has lost two important components, the Islamic Virtue Party (Fadhila) and the Sadr Movement. The former pulled their 15 MPs out of the alliance, the latter pulled its 6 cabinet ministers out of the government. Now the Sunni Arabs appear to be decamping, to protest the arrest of one of their own (on charges of having the sons of a fellow Sunni MP whacked).
The "surge" was intended to 'create political space' for 'reconciliation' between Sunnis and Shiites. Now the only Sunnis who were willing to cooperate with the political process are threatening to pull out of the al-Maliki government. Wouldn't that be going backward? Then what is the 'surge' for?
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