Iraq: Vice-President Hashemi blames PM Maliki for Baghdad blasts.

BBC - Iraq’s Vice-President Tariq al-Hashemi has said Prime Minister Nouri Maliki is to blame for a sudden surge of violence in the country.

Dozens of people were killed in a string of blasts across the capital, Baghdad, on Thursday.

Mr Hashemi, who is subject to an arrest warrant on terror charges, said that Mr Maliki should be focusing on security not “chasing patriotic politicians”.

The crisis has sparked fears of renewed sectarian conflict in Iraq.

Mr Maliki is from the majority Shia Arab group while Mr Hashemi is one of the country’s most prominent Sunni politicians.

He has been accused of orchestrating terror attacks on officials and security forces, a charge he denies. In response, the main Sunni political bloc, al-Iraqiyya, is blockading parliament and the cabinet, putting the future of the fragile year-old unity government in doubt.

“We should blame Mr Maliki, he started a national crisis and it’s not easy to control,” Mr Hashemi told the BBC’s Arabic Service.

With US forces barely out of the country there is a danger that Iraq’s fragile political consensus could unravel along communal lines.

Always an uneasy amalgam of Shia, Sunni and Kurdish groupings, the political arrangements instituted in the wake of the Americans’ toppling of Saddam Hussein’s regime are now under pressure like never before.

It is hard to know exactly who is behind the current wave of bombings in Baghdad. But in a curious way the violence plays into the hands of all factions seeking to gain from the growing sense of crisis.

Inevitably this crisis is interpreted in some quarters as an effort by the dominant Shia faction to settle scores with its Sunni rivals. Iran is seen by many analysts as operating behind the scenes to bolster the Shia position.

Iran may well be an interested party but this is a genuinely Iraqi crisis fuelled by the diverging political ambitions of Iraqi leaders.
In pictures: Baghdad explosions

He said the attacks happened because the government was too busy chasing “patriotic politicians” instead of terrorists:

“What happened today shows the deficiency and it’s a good evidence for the lack of control over administration of the security brief; because the security services are pointed in the wrong direction.”

Mr Hashemi has previously compared the prime minister’s behaviour and style of government to that of deposed former leader Saddam Hussein, telling US Foreign Policy magazine Mr Maliki was “very much adamant about running this country in a very bad and tough way”.

Thursday’s attack were the worst to hit Iraq in months, and came just after the US withdrew its troops, ending nearly nine years of military engagement.

At least 68 people were killed and nearly 200 injured as car and roadside bombs went off in 16 separate locations, mostly Shia areas of the city.

The first 13 bombs hit as people were going to work in the morning – they were followed by other blasts throughout the day.

Officials said schools and kindergartens had been among the targets.