Iraq reconciliation meeting off to shaky start

By Waleed Ibrahim

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A conference to reconcile Iraq's warring political groups began to unravel even before it got under way on Tuesday, with the main Sunni Muslim Arab bloc pulling out and protesting it had not been properly invited.

The gathering, billed as the biggest of its kind in Iraq, aimed to bring leaders of rival factions together around much-delayed so-called laws meant to promote common cause between majority Shi'ites and minority Sunni Arabs.

The Accordance Front, the main Sunni Arab bloc, had said it would attend but pulled out as dozens of political leaders gathered at a hotel in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone.

"The Front will not attend the conference, not because it does not believe in reconciliation ... but because the invitations were sent to members of the Front and not formally to the Accordance Front," spokesman Salim al-Jubouri said.

Jubouri said decisions from previous meetings had never been implemented. "How can we now arrange new proposals?", he said.

Washington has urged Iraq's leaders to take advantage of security gains and make political progress.

The ability of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's Shi'ite-led government to pass laws was badly hampered last year by the withdrawal of key factions, including the Accordance Front and politicians loyal to anti-U.S. Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

The head of the Sadrist political bloc, Nassar al-Rubaie, arrived at the conference but refused to say whether he would take an active role.

"Such conferences are just government propaganda," Rubaie told Reuters.

The Sadrists withdrew from government last year over its refusal to set a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops.

Almost all of Iraq's major political groups had said they would take part and many expected success.

"What makes this conference more important than previous ones is that the situation now is conducive for national dialogue, and political rapprochement is at its best among rival political groups," said Jalaldin al-Sagheer, a senior figure in the Shi'ite Alliance, Iraq's biggest parliamentary bloc.

Security improvements have helped build confidence. Attacks across Iraq have fallen 60 percent since last June due to many factors, including a U.S. troop buildup of an extra 30,000 troops, a ceasefire by the Sadr Mehdi Army militia and the establishment of mainly Sunni Arab neighborhood security units.

Iraq has made some progress on benchmark reconciliation legislation, with parliament last month passing the 2008 budget, an amnesty law that would free thousands of mainly Sunni Arab prisoners from Iraqi jails and a provincial powers law.

But the provincial powers law has been sent back to parliament for review and lawmakers remain deadlocked on a crucial law that would decide how revenues from Iraq's vast oil reserves, the world's third largest, are shared.