Posted on 12/02/2006 6:12:38 PM PST by familyop
LONDON, December 2 (IranMania) - Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, a top Iraqi Shiite leader with close ties to Iran, will meet with President Bush next week, the White House confirmed, CNN reported.
Al-Hakim leads the powerful Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI, a rival group to the political movement led by firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
US National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said the meeting was set for Monday.
"President Bush looks forward to an exchange of views and a discussion of important issues facing Iraq today," Johndroe said.
Also, a senior administration official said Bush will meet with a Sunni leader, Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, in January at the White House.
The visits come against a backdrop of deadly Sunni-Shiite sectarian warfare in Iraq that has led some observers to say a civil war has engulfed the country.
Bush returned from a summit Thursday with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in Jordan focusing on the deteriorating security situation.
Al-Hakim and Bush will discuss the political crisis in Iraq, said al-Hakim's aide, Haitham Husseini.
But Husseini declined to discuss whether the Washington visit would mark the beginning of a dialogue between the United States and Iran. The Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq also has closes ties with neighboring Iran.
There are "big issues to be discussed" and "Iraqis welcome any effort from neighboring countries to be part of the effort to bring peace to Iraq," Husseini said.
In the past, Bush has accused Iran of providing material support to Iraq's insurgency. The administration has resisted calls for diplomacy with the Iranians.
Exile in Iran: In 1982, during Saddam Hussein's regime and its war with Iran, the SCIRI was founded in Iran as a guerilla movement, said the Council on Foreign Relations. The group's militia, the Badr Brigades, staged armed attacks against Hussein's regime, according to the council's Web site.
"Al-Hakim's beliefs align with Shiite leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani's, in that he supports a secular democracy that recognizes the importance of Islam but bars clerics from overtly exercising political power," the council says on its Web site, noting that al-Hakim lived in exile in Iran for more than 20 years before returning to Iraq.
Husseini said the White House invitation came months ago in a Bush phone call to al-Hakim, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rica mentioned it again during her last trip to Iraq.
Bush called al-Hakim in February to express his condolences and support following the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad. Outrage about the attack sparked increased sectarian violence in Iraq.
Al-Hakim's and al-Sadr's movements, along with al-Maliki's Dawa Party, are part of the United Iraqi Alliance, Iraq's Shiite-led ruling party.
Al-Sadr's supporters struck a blow to the Iraqi prime minister's political standing this week when they announced they were suspending participation in the government because of al-Maliki's Jordan summit with Bush, a meeting they vehemently opposed.
The group, which has 30 parliament members and six Cabinet ministers, set demands for the ending of its government boycott, in particular a timetable for US troop withdrawal.
Along with this boycott, the al-Sadr people announced intentions to form a cross-sectarian alliance with others, Sunnis, Christians, Kurds and Turkmens.
Such a shift in political allegiance could create big political changes in Iraq.
The prime minister got his job earlier this year in part with the support of the United States and al-Sadr, whose Mehdi Army militia is thought to be behind much of the sectarian attacks.
Al-Sadr's group and the SCIRI differ on the key issue of federalism. The latter favors a Shiite autonomous region in the south, while al-Sadr's people oppose this position, taking the same stance as Sunnis.
Al-Maliki said Thursday he believed Iraqi forces would be ready by June to take full control of security in Iraq, an issue on which he pressed Bush during their Jordan meeting.
It's interesting that it took the heads of GM, Ford and Chrysler Group six month to arrange a meeting with Bush, but someone with ties to Iran is welcome any time.
Bush trying anything possible before the USA/Israel have to take action ?
Or maybe Bush is still stuck in the Teddy For Popcorn--Daschle over for Movies --mind set and applying it to foreign affairs
Doesn't read as desperate to me.
Any thing other than "Total War" results in failure. We should do the same thing to these bastards in the middle-east that we did in Europe against Nazis back in 1940s
They better x-ray this guy, check him for raditation, and turn him inside out before he gets near the prez.
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