Iraq initiates search for new prime minister

~ Al-Jaafari steps down, freeing Shiite lawmakers to choose someone else to head the next government.

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- For weeks, Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari resisted calls to step aside. It took a meeting between the U.N. envoy and the country's most powerful Shiite cleric to break the logjam that Iraqi politicians and U.S. officials could not budge.

Barely 24 hours after saying stepping down was out of the question, al-Jaafari freed Shiite lawmakers Thursday to choose someone else to head the next government and made what appeared to be a farewell speech.

"I cannot allow myself to be an obstacle, or appear to be an obstacle," al-Jaafari said on Iraqi television. He said his fellow Shiite lawmakers should "think with complete freedom and see what they wish to do."

Al-Jaafari's abrupt reversal was an apparent breakthrough in the frustrating struggle to form a national unity government. The Bush administration hopes such a government will curb Iraq's slide toward anarchy and enable the U.S. to begin bringing home its 133,000 troops.

Although al-Jaafari offered no details about what changed his mind, some Shiite and Kurdish politicians said it was the intercession of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq's most revered Shiite cleric and the spiritual leader of the seven-party Shiite alliance.

Al-Sistani met Wednesday in Najaf with U.N. envoy Ashraf Qazi, who has been working with U.S. and British officials to mediate an end to the standoff over formation of a new government.

The next day, al-Jaafari was bowing out.

"There was a signal from Najaf," Kurdish politician Mahmoud Othman told The Associated Press. Qazi's talks in Najaf with al-Sistani as well as with radical anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr "were the chief reason that untied the knot."

Aides to al-Sistani, the spiritual leader of the Shiite alliance, said the aging, Iranian-born ayatollah was frustrated over the political deadlock and alarmed over the rise in sectarian violence that followed the Feb. 22 bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra.

Al-Sistani's role was yet another sign of the political power held by the Shiite clergy in an Iraq freed of Saddam Hussein's rule. Shiite politicians turn frequently to the clergy for the politically tough decisions that they cannot make.

Sunni and Kurdish politicians blamed the rise of sectarian tensions on al-Jaafari for failing to rein in Shiite militias and Interior Ministry commandoes, accused by the Sunnis of harboring death squads. Those parties refused to join any government headed by al-Jaafari.

With al-Jaafari out of the way, Sunni and Kurdish politicians predicted parliament would speed up formation of a unity government.

Leaders in the seven-party Shiite alliance, the largest bloc in the 275-member parliament, were to meet Friday to begin choosing a replacement.

If representatives of the seven alliance parties cannot reach a consensus on a single candidate, they will put several choices to a vote before the bloc's 130 parliament members Saturday, officials said.

The final choice would be presented to parliament later Saturday.

In theory, al-Jaafari could try again to win the nomination. But Bassem Sharif, a prominent Shiite lawmaker, said the alliance "is leaning toward" replacing him. "The majority opinion is in favor of this."

But their field of candidates lacks stature and power, raising questions whether the new prime minister will be any more successful than al-Jaafari in confronting sectarian violence and the brutal insurgency.

Names most often mentioned as possible replacements include two members of al-Jaafari's Dawa party, Ali al-Adeeb and Jawad al-Maliki. Neither is widely known among Iraqis, and neither has extensive experience in administration or government.

Al-Maliki, who fled Iraq in the 1980s and settled in Syria, is considered more of a Shiite hard-liner than al-Jaafari is. Al-Adeeb lived for many years in Iran before returning to Iraq after the collapse of Saddam's regime in 2003.

As the largest bloc in parliament with 130 seats, the Shiite alliance gets to name the prime minister. But the Shiites lack the votes to guarantee parliament's approval unless they have the backing of the Sunnis and Kurds, whom they need as partners to govern.

Sunnis and Kurds blame al-Jaafari for failing to consult his coalition partners. Kurds also accused him of failing to keep commitments over oil-rich Kirkuk, which the Kurds want to incorporate into their three-province self-ruled region in the north.

Many Shiite politicians had been quietly pressing al-Jaafari to step down, but were reluctant to force him out for fear it would shatter the Shiite alliance.

Al-Jaafari -- who had won the Shiites' nomination in February by a single vote with backing from al-Sadr -- told a press conference Wednesday that stepping aside was "out of the question."

But he backed down in an emotional address on national television Thursday night. "The one thing I cannot compromise is my dedication to this heroic people," he said.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said there were "indications" the impasse would be resolved. He called for a strong and effective government that could "begin to repay the trust put in the political parties and the political leaders by the Iraqi people."

Stepping up the pressure this month, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw flew to Baghdad and demanded quick action to resolve the impasse. However, several Iraqi figures complained the U.S. and British intervention had prompted al-Jaafari's supporters to dig in their heels against what many Iraqis considered foreign interference.

With the issue over the premiership nearing resolution, Sunni and Kurdish politicians expressed optimism that the new government could be formed quickly.

"I am confident we will succeed in forming the national unity government that all Iraqis are hoping for," Sunni elder statesman Adnan Pachachi told reporters.

Whoever gets the prime minister's job will face enormous problems, not only in coping with sectarian violence, the armed insurgency and a crumbling economy but also in maneuvering between SCIRI's powerful leader, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, and al-Sadr.

Al-Hakim and al-Sadr come from two of the most prestigious Shiite families, and each aspires to leadership of the majority Shiite community. Armed militias affiliated with the two men are engaged in an intense struggle for power in towns and cities throughout the Shiite heartland south of Baghdad.

Al-Hakim's party controls the Interior Ministry, whose commandos have been blamed by many Sunni Arabs for harboring death squads that target Sunni civilians. Al-Sadr's Mahdi militia was believed responsible for many of the attacks against Sunni mosques following the Samarra bombing.

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Associated Press reporter Qassim Abdul-Zahra contributed to this report.