Iraqi Puppet not America's Man

IHT

Embattled Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ratcheted up his high-stakes and increasingly bitter dispute with the Bush administration, telling the U.S. ambassador that he was Washington's friend but "not America's man in Iraq," aides said on Saturday.

The Shiite leader issued the declaration in a meeting Friday with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, after which the two leaders issued a rare joint statement declaring the need to work together to set timelines to clamp off spiraling violence attributed to Shiite militias and death squads.

"I am a friend of the United States, but I am not America's man in Iraq," Hassan al-Suneid, a close al-Maliki aide quoted him as telling Khalilzad during the meeting.

The insider's account of the session was in sharp contrast to the joint al-Maliki-Khalilzad statement that was issued both by the American Embassy and al-Maliki's office late Friday night.

Al-Suneid said the prime minister demanded that his government be treated as an elected administration which enjoys international legitimacy and that U.S. forces in Iraq must coordinate better with his government.

The joint statement, however, appeared to signal that al-Maliki was backing down from his highly publicized squabble with the Bush administration and dropping his objections to a timeline proposed by Washington for bringing security to his war-ravaged nation. Read more