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10/04/2005:

"Iraqi minister lashes out at Saudi Arabia"

AMMAN (AFP) - Iraq's interior minister delivered a scathing attack on neighbouring Saudi Arabia, saying his country would not be lectured by "a bedouin on a camel" about human rights and democracy.

"We do not accept a bedouin on a camel teaching us about human rights and democracy. In Iraq, we are proud of our civilisation," Bayan Baqer Sulagh told a press conference in Amman after talks on boosting border security.

The Shiite minister said the oil-rich Sunni-ruled kingdom had several problems of its own to take care of.

"Saudis should first allow women to drive, as is the case in Iraq," he said Sunday, adding that "four million Shiites live like second-class citizens in the Saudi kingdom."

He was responding to Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal's accusations that Iran was seeking to spread its influence in Iraq and that sectarian divisions were threatening to break up the country.
news.yahoo.com

Iraq's President Calls for PM to Step Down
KIRKUK, Iraq (AP) - Iraq's Kurdish president called on the country's Shiite prime minister to step down, the spokesman for the president's party said Sunday, escalating a political split between the two factions that make up the government.

Sunni Arab leaders, meanwhile, were angered after the Shiite-dominated parliament passed a new ruling on a key Oct. 15 that makes it more difficult for Sunnis to defeat the draft constitution that they oppose.

The political wrangling deepened the splits between Iraq's three main communities amid a constitutional process that was aimed at bringing them together to build a democratic nation. Kurds complained that Shiites were monopolizing the government, while Sunnis - who have made up the backbone of the violent insurgency - accused Shiites of stacking the deck against them in the political process.

The Kurdish-Shiite split hits the core of the coalition that has made up the transitional government. President Jalal Talabani has made veiled threats to pull the Kurds out of the coalition if their demands are not met, a step that could bring the government's collapse.

Talabani has accused the Shiite-led United Iraqi Alliance, which holds the majority in parliament, of failing to fairly distribute government positions to Kurds, neglecting ministries run by Kurdish officials and refusing to move ahead on the resettlement of Kurds in the northern city of Kirkuk.