| Heavily edited because it's typical SeeBS / AP hash it all together pseudo-journalism. |
(SeeBS/AP) As Sunnis and Shiites continue to target each other in Iraq, top leaders from each group will be meeting with President Bush.
First up will be one of the most powerful Shiite politicians in Iraq, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim. He will meet Mr. Bush on Monday to discuss ways to improve the deteriorating situation. Al-Hakim is leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI, the largest party in Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's governing coalition. He is a rival of al-Maliki, and many consider al-Hakim an even more powerful political figure because of his party's electoral strength among Shiites and its Badr Brigade militia. U.S. intelligence sources tell CBS News that al-Hakim's forces were the first to send death squads against Sunni targets, CBS News White House correspondent Bill Plante reports.SCIRI runs the Badr Brigade, a militia that is widely blamed for some of the sectarian killings that have been tearing Iraq apart since the bombing of a major Shiite shrine north of Baghdad in February. Al-Hakim repeatedly has denied the involvement of the Badr Brigade in the violence, arguing the militia has been turned into a political organization. Before succeeding his slain brother as leader of SCIRI, al-Hakim was in charge of Badr, which was trained and armed by Iran's Revolutionary Guard and fought on the side of Iran in its eight-year war against Saddam Hussein's army in the 1980s.
The empowerment of Iraq's Shiites following the ouster of Saddam's Sunni-led regime in 2003 has been a source of alarm to many governments in the overwhelmingly Sunni Arab world and sparked fear of Iran's growing influence in the region.
Bush will meet with al-Hakim in Washington on Monday in a bid to find a new approach in Iraq, said National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe. "President Bush looks forward to an exchange of views and a discussion of important issues facing Iraq today," Johndroe said.