Philly Dot Com : Political infighting blocks action on oil bill in Iraq

Political infighting blocks action on oil bill in Iraq

It is seen as a setback for a Sept. progress report in U.S.

By Tina Susman | Los Angeles Times

BAGHDAD - Political infighting blocked lawmakers from opening debate yesterday on legislation to oversee the oil industry as Iraqi and U.S. leaders called for reconciliation among Iraq's feuding factions.

An influential group of Sunni Muslim clerics, the Association of Muslim Scholars, joined the fray surrounding the oil bill yesterday by issuing a religious edict, forbidding legislators from voting for it.

"Whoever does so will be exposed to God's wrath and will have committed the crime of collaboration with the enemy," said a statement from the group, a fierce opponent of the U.S. occupation.

The developments were an ominous sign for U.S. and Iraqi leaders, who have counted on passage of the legislation to show evidence of political progress before parliament starts a monthlong break July 31. U.S. officials must give Congress a progress report on Iraq in September, leaving little time for the measure to win approval.

Also yesterday, two U.S. soldiers were killed in Iraq. One died in Nineveh province in northwestern Iraq when his helicopter was shot down. A second soldier was injured. In southern Baghdad, another soldier was killed, the military announced, bringing to at least 3,588 the number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq since the invasion of March 2003.

At a gathering yesterday, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki urged lawmakers to trade the "language of confrontation" for the "language of cooperation," a message to legislators whose boycotts of parliament and squabbling have hobbled the government.

Maliki joined Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker, and Army Gen. David H. Petraeus in addressing hundreds of guests for a U.S. Independence Day celebration.

"It's not easy to stand united," Petraeus said. "We learned that lesson during our own nation's history, and we are seeing that in Iraq today."

The parliament has proved incapable of overcoming its sectarian rivalries, and none of the legislation considered essential to national reconciliation has been passed into law.

The oil legislation is considered the most important, because of the potential wealth to be derived from the oil industry. The legislation is made up of two bills, one of which is a framework to oversee management of the industry. The other, known as the revenue-sharing law, would lay out the mechanisms for distributing oil revenues.

Wrangling over the bill is so tough because it hits on the most contentious question over the future shape of Iraq: how to balance power between the central government and the country's regions, divided on sectarian and ethnic lines. The demands of each side - Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish - for the bill are far apart, and often mutually exclusive.

Sunnis, centered in parts of the country with few proven reserves, fear that Shiites and Kurds in the oil-rich south and north will monopolize profits from the industry - and so want a stronger federal role to ensure a Sunni say in how the fields are run.

The bill's framework was passed by the cabinet on Tuesday, but various political blocs immediately began objecting to it. Kurdish lawmakers, who just days ago had expressed support for the measure, said they had not seen the draft that was passed Tuesday and could not guarantee their support for it. Sunni legislators have said the bill would open the industry to foreign investors, mainly U.S. oil companies, and deprive Iraqis of their due wealth.

The 44-member main Sunni bloc is boycotting parliament over an unrelated issue. That would make it difficult to give legitimacy to the oil bill even if it passed. Without their presence, Kurdish lawmaker Mahmoud Othman said, it was not possible to debate the measure.

The revenue-sharing bill has not been passed by the cabinet.