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By SELCAN HACAOGLU
The Associated Press
Sunday, August 3, 2008; 10:30 AM BAGHDAD -- A truck bomb exploded during rush hour Sunday on a busy
commercial street in northern Baghdad, killing at least 12 people and
wounding about two dozen, Iraqi police and health officials said.
The attack came as Kurdish leaders held intense negotiations with
government officials aimed at defusing a crisis over Kurdish demands to
incorporate the disputed city of Kirkuk and surrounding areas into their
autonomous region, government officials said. The talks, attended by
U.S. and U.N. officials, were still under way and forced the
postponement of a special parliamentary session over the dispute on
Sunday, the officials said. The debate over Kirkuk and its vast oil wealth has blocked passage of
legislation providing for provincial elections this year, a major U.S.
goal aimed at reconciling Iraq's rival ethnic and religious communities. The United Nations has recommended postponing provincial elections in
Tamim province, where Kirkuk is the capital, as a way of ensuring the
voting can take place elsewhere in the country. A senior parliamentary official said lawmakers were leaning toward
approving the U.N. proposal and would wait for a committee to submit its
recommendations at the end of the year. He spoke on condition of
anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information. Sunni Arabs and Turkomen in Kirkuk are seeking international protection,
the official said. Underscoring the importance of the Kirkuk issue, U.S. President George
W. Bush telephoned the Sunni parliamentary speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani
and Shiite Vice President Adel Abdul-Mahdi to urge a resolution,
according to statements Sunday from their offices. "President Bush has been working with the Iraqis to encourage them to
work out their differences and get the provincial elections law passed,"
said Dana Perino, the White House press secretary. "To that end, he
spoke to several senior Iraqi officials yesterday as they near the end
of the legislative process both to offer encouragement and stress the
importance of getting the law through the final stages of the
legislative process." As Kurdish officials and the government engaged in heated debate, health
officials tended to the wounded after a small, explosives-packed truck
blew up some 200 yards from a passport office in one of Baghdad's Sunni
Arab districts. Police and health officials said 12 people were killed and at least 23
others were wounded. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they
were not authorized to talk to media. It was the first major bombing in Baghdad since last Monday, when three
suicide bombers killed more than 30 people and wounded hundreds during a
Shiite religious procession. Residents of Kirkuk fear that if lawmakers fail to reach agreement,
tension could rise in the city, where a suicide bomb attack killed 25
people last week during a Kurdish protest. "I hope they can reach a solution that fits all parties and prevents the
situation from deteriorating further," said Yelman Ayad, a 59-year-old
Turkoman who sells spare car parts in Kirkuk. "The mistakes of politicians brought us to this stage. Our social fabric
was torn up in Kirkuk, and this is very dangerous for all of Iraq," Ayad
said. Last month, Iraq's parliament approved legislation to hold elections for
local councils in all 18 provinces. The measure said seats on the Tamim provincial council should be divided
equally among Kurds, Turkomen and Arabs. It would also transfer security
responsibilities in Kirkuk to mostly Arab military units brought from
central and southern Iraq instead of those already there _ an apparent
move against Kurdish troops heavily deployed in the area. But Kurds and their allies, who currently hold a majority on the
council, oppose the power-sharing formula. Iraq's three-member
presidential council rejected the measure and sent it back to parliament
after President Jalal Talabani _ a Kurd _ opposed it. Saleh al-Jabouri, a 26-year-old Sunni Arab who owns a supermarket in
Kirkuk, criticized that step. "It was a democratic process, why did they reject it?" he asked. "We
(Arabs) are against any new resolution that could affect our presence in
this city." Parliament adjourned for a one-month summer recess last week but agreed
to hold a special session Sunday to try to resolve the standoff and
approve a new election bill. Electoral officials have said failure to
pass the bill could delay the nationwide vote until next year. Meanwhile, a roadside bomb killed six people, including three Iraqi
soldiers, and wounded 13 others Sunday south of Baghdad, police said. In Tarmiyah, north of Baghdad, a clash between U.S.-allied fighters and
civilians killed one civilian Sunday and wounded 10 others, local police
said. The U.S. military said Sunday that a suspected Shiite militiaman
believed to have recently returned from Iran was detained along with
another suspect in the southern city of Qurna. The military has claimed success against Shiite militias it says are
trained and funded by Iran despite denials from Tehran. But skeptics
fear the fighters will regroup and try to reassert power. The U.S. military also said one American soldier died and another was
injured in a vehicle accident southwest of Baghdad a day earlier. At least 4,128 members of the U.S. military have died in the Iraq war
since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
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