US President George W. Bush and Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki will meet each other in Jordan next week to discuss and to work on the problems in Iraq.
A U.N. report said 3,709 civilians were killed in October — 120 a day and up from 3,345 in September. In all, 418,392 moved to other parts of Iraq since the February bombing of a Shi’ite shrine in Samarra triggered a surge in sectarian violence.
[…]
They will be the first lengthy talks between Bush and Maliki since Bush pledged a new approach on Iraq after his Democratic opponents took control of Congress.A month ago the two spoke to ease mutual irritation about how much the other was doing to halt violence.
They agreed to draw up plans for accelerating the training of Iraqi forces and the transfer of responsibility. Maliki said Iraqis could take charge in six months, half the U.S. estimate.
[…]
A joint statement on the November 29-30 summit said: “We will focus our discussions on current developments in Iraq, progress made to date in the deliberations of a high-level joint committee on transferring security responsibility and the role of the region in supporting Iraq.”
[…]
With Bush’s allies urging him to reach out on Iraq to U.S. adversaries in Tehran and Damascus, Washington reacted coolly to the flurry of regional diplomacy seen with Syria restoring full relations with Iraq and Talabani saying he would visit Iran.
The UN human rights report says that the violence is increasing, that entire neighborhoods have been split up or (partially) abandoned and that among the main targets of militias are journalists, academics, Christians, lawyers and judges.
I have absolutely no confidence in Maliki’s ability to deal with the Sectarian violence. Probably no one has. I am not even sure whether he wants to do something about it.
And Iran? It seems that Ahmadinejad and the Mullahs will try to expand their power in Iraq by using diplomacy. It might seem attractive to Iraq’s leaders to work with the new regional power, but it will be a tragic mistake.
PAST CONTRIBUTOR.