No Kisses or Slaps for Iraq Leader

[April 10, 2008]  WASHINGTON (AP) -- Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was the invisible man at this week's appearances in Congress by President Bush's top military and diplomatic advisers in Iraq. He may like it that way.

Al-Maliki's name came up now and then over two days of testimony by Gen. David Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker, but there were only a handful of questions about his leadership abilities, commitment to ending corruption or ties to Iran.

When Petraeus and Crocker came before Congress last year, lawmakers from both parties were openly skeptical that the Iraqi leader was sufficiently dedicated to U.S. objectives for his country, or even up to the job.

During two days of hearings ending Wednesday, the top U.S. general and diplomat in Iraq offered neither warm endorsement nor outright criticism of al-Maliki, a U.S.-backed Shiite leader whose political fortunes also have been in doubt at home.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., tried to get a rise out of the U.S. officials by asking why Americans should bankroll the war and support the al-Maliki government while the Iraqi leader welcomes Iran's hard-line leader to Baghdad with a kiss.

"They kissed him on the cheek!" Boxer exclaimed Tuesday. "He got a red carpet treatment and we are losing our sons and daughters every single day for the Iraqis to be free. It is irritating."

Crocker said Iraq's relationship with its Shiite neighbor is complicated and informed by the war the two nations fought in the 1980s. He also noted that Vice President Dick Cheney, in Baghdad shortly after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited in March, "also had a very warm reception."

"Did he get kissed?" cracked Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph Biden, D-Del.

"Uh, I believe he did get kissed," Crocker replied. He was trying very hard not to laugh.

Congressionally mandated benchmarks for Iraqi political, military and economic progress came up, but they were not the focus this time. Some of the benchmarks are as much a measure of al-Maliki as the nation he leads, and at times he clearly has found the rubric insulting.

Crocker approvingly noted recent rapid work on several of the benchmarks, including plans for provincial elections this fall. He said Iraq has now completed or made significant progress on 12 out of 18 measures. Congressional Democrats disagreed, but quickly moved on.

Petraeus and Crocker said al-Maliki has rallied political support across Iraq's complex sectarian divisions since taking on the Shiite militia led by a former political protector, the anti-American cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr.

Democrats focused on the short notice al-Maliki gave his American benefactors before launching the assault on Basra, and the role that Iran played in ending the open fighting, but the U.S. officials said al-Maliki is emerging stronger.

"The way Iraqis are reading the events of Basra and Baghdad is the government against extremist militias," Crocker told a house panel Wednesday. "That's what has fused political support for Prime Minister Maliki and his government in a way that we just haven't seen."

Crocker said he and Petraeus had met with al-Maliki the day before they came to Washington, and have regular contact with other Iraqi leaders as well.

"We do in those contacts register our views. We consult," Crocker said. "But at the same time, Prime Minister Maliki is the leader of a sovereign government, and as we saw in Basra, he will take his own decisions."

Both men acknowledged the short notice the U.S. received on al-Maliki's plans to attack the Mahdi Army in Basra, but Petraeus made a point of praising the speed with which the Iraqi forces moved in. That would not have been possible a year ago, the general said.

[Associated Press; By ANNE GEARAN]

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