Iraqi Sunnis open to backing new PM

Tribal leaders and clerics from Iraq’s Sunni heartland who staged a revolt against outgoing prime minister Nuri al-Maliki’s Shia-led government would be willing to join the new administration if certain conditions are met, a spokesman for the group told Reuters on Friday.

The spokesman, Taha Mohammed Al-Hamdoon, said on Friday Sunni representatives in Anbar and other provinces had drawn up a list of demands to be delivered to the moderate incoming prime minister, Haider al-Abadi.

He called for government and Shia militia forces to suspend hostilities to allow space for talks.

“It is not possible for any negotiations to be held under barrel bombs and indiscriminate bombing,” said Hamdoon in a telephone interview.

“Let the bombing stop and withdraw and curtail the [Shia] militias until there is a solution for the wise men in these areas.”

Abadi faces the daunting task of pacifying Anbar province, where Sunni frustrations with Maliki’s sectarian policies have pushed some to join an insurgency led by Islamic State militants, the Reuters news agency reported.

Underscoring the urgency of containing a sectarian conflict fuelled by fighters from the Islamic State group, Sistani, who delivered his message in a weekly sermon through a spokesman, urged the military to hoist only Iraq’s flag to avoid factionalism.

Meanwhile Abadi on Friday urged his countrymen to unite in the face of dangerous challenges and cautioned that the road ahead would be tough.

On his Facebook page, Abadi on Friday said he would not make unrealistic promises but he encouraged Iraqis to work together to strengthen the country, which is being wracked by sectarian violence.

Maliki on Thursday stepped down as the country’s prime minister, bowing to huge domestic and international pressure. He voiced support for his designated successor Abadi, a fellow member of the Shia Dawa party.

After a US occupation lasting nearly a decade, which ended in 2011 with a price tag of more than $2 trillion, Iraq is nowhere near the stability promised when Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003.

Maliki was widely resented as a divisive and authoritarian figure who drew comparisons with the former Iraqi dictator.

Winning over Sunnis, who dominated under Saddam and were sidelined by Maliki, will be vital to any efforts to contain a sectarian civil war marked by almost daily kidnappings, execution-style killings and bombings.