| 2008: Iraq lawmakers pass key budget and amnesty laws |
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February 13, 2008 Iraqi lawmakers achieved a major breakthrough on Wednesday, passing the 2008 budget after weeks of delay and an amnesty law that could lead to the release of thousands of prisoners from the country's jails. Parliament also passed a provincial powers law that will define ties between Baghdad and local authorities. That paves the way for provincial elections to be held by October 1. "I'd like to congratulate the ... government and people of Iraq for these significant accomplishments," the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, told reporters. Scores of lawmakers had stormed out of the legislature on Tuesday evening, blocking a vote on the bills in a sign of the deep distrust between the country's Shi'ite, Sunni Arab and Kurdish politicians. Some MPs said parliament should be disbanded and new elections held. But parliament convened again on Wednesday and despite a walkout by some lawmakers, managed to overcome a row over voting procedures to pass the three measures as a package. "We have proven today that Iraqis are just one bloc," said parliament speaker Mahmoud Mashhadani, a Sunni Arab. Washington has pressed Iraqi leaders to pass legislation to help heal sectarian divisions that have festered during a Sunni Arab insurgency against U.S. forces and savage violence between majority Shi'ites and minority Sunnis. The laws passed on Wednesday are not among several key benchmarks sought by the United States, but the measures, especially the amnesty law, would still form an important component of reconciliation, U.S. officials have said. The main Sunni Arab bloc, the Accordance Front, said passage of the amnesty law would help accelerate its return to the Shi'ite-led government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. The Front, which quit the government in August, has long demanded the release of security detainees. U.S. forces and Iraqi authorities each hold more than 23,000 prisoners, many of them Sunni Arabs behind the insurgency against the American-backed government that erupted after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003. "We have no doubt that passing this law will have a remarkably positive effect in speeding up the return of the Accordance Front to the government," said Salim al-Jubouri, a lawmaker and spokesman for the bloc. The government has said prisoners under investigation, on trial or convicted could be eligible to be freed. The pardon would exclude those convicted of major crimes such as terrorism. It only applies to prisoners in Iraqi custody. BUDGET BITTERNESS Lawmakers had also spent weeks wrangling bitterly over the level of spending on the largely autonomous Kurdish region. Some Shi'ite and Sunni Arab lawmakers had said Kurdistan should get less money based on current population estimates. Officials had said the prolonged delay in approving the $48 billion budget was holding up vital spending at a time when the United States is urging the government to jumpstart the economy to take advantage of falls in violence. In recent days, leaders of the political blocs agreed to vote on all three measures as a package because of mutual suspicion that if one was voted on separately and approved, the faction that wanted that most would renege on the rest. Parliament also passed a law last month that will allow former members of Saddam's Baath party to regain their jobs in the government and military, a key demand of Sunni Arabs who were dominant under the former dictator. But Maliki's government has struggled to make headway on other key laws, especially legislation that would equitably share the country's vast oil reserves. In Basra, negotiators said they had struck a deal to release two CBS News journalists missing, believed kidnapped, in the country's southern oil city. Police in Basra said the men, a British journalist and an interpreter, were seized from a city centre hotel on Sunday. |