Iraq: Maliki stands with Sunni leaders, appealing for Iraqi unity

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki broadcast a joint appeal for national unity on Tuesday with bitter Sunni critics of his Shi'ite-led government - a move that may help him win U.S. help against rampant Islamists threatening Baghdad.

Just hours after Maliki's Shi'ite allies had angrily vowed to boycott any cooperation with the biggest Sunni party and his government had accused Sunni neighbor Saudi Arabia of backing "genocide", the premier's visibly uncomfortable televised appearance may reflect U.S. impatience with its Baghdad protege.

In a rerun of previous failed efforts at bridging sectarian and ethnic divisions, Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish leaders met behind closed doors and then stood frostily before cameras as Maliki's Shi'ite predecessor Ibrahim al-Jaafari read a statement denouncing "terrorist powers" and supporting Iraqi sovereignty.

U.S. President Barack Obama is considering military options to push back al Qaeda splinter group the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which has swept the Sunni north of the country over the past week as the Shi'ite-led army has crumbled.

But in return Washington want Maliki to do more to address the widespread sense of political exclusion among minority Sunnis which ISIL has exploited to win support among tribal leaders and former followers of ousted dictator Saddam Hussein.


Read More: Maliki stands with Sunni leaders, appealing for Iraqi unity | Reuters

Saudi Arabia: Shiite cleric calls for calm after protesters clash with Saudi force

Saudi Arabia has promised harsh retribution after 11 members of the security forces were attacked and injured during unrest in an eastern Shiite villag in Saudi Arabia.

Saudi security forces were fired at from side streets after they stopped a small demonstration in Awwamiya, the interior ministry spokesman, Maj Gen Mansour Al Turki, said. "It wasn't a confrontation between the police and the people," he said. "I don't expect this to be repeated. It was an isolated incident."

Saudi's interior ministry blamed the unrest on a "foreign country", according to a statement released by the kingdom's official news agency. Shiite activists in Gulf countries are regularly accused of having links with their co-religionists in rival Iran.

Tension in the village grew on Monday when Saudi police arrested two men, both in their 70s, in a bid to force their sons, accused of taking part in Shiite-led protests, to surrender, an activist said.

Forbes magazine recently wrote about Saudi Arabia: " Saudi Arabia, despite it’s recent embrace of the cause of democracy and freedom in Syria, is and has been for the past 80 odd years one of the most violently repressive and backwards societies in the world: an absolute dictatorship replete with “morality police” and various other kinds of religious totalitarians.* Saudi Arabia not only violently represses and persecutes its small Shiite minority**, it militarily intervened in neighboring Bahrain to help that country’s authoritarian political elite  viciously and cruelly repress a popular uprising by the majority Shiites."

Read more: Shiite cleric calls for calm after protesters clash with Saudi force - The National