Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki refused on Friday to give up his quest for a third term in power, defying a chorus of critics demanding his replacement as the country faces an existential threat from Islamist insurgents, Reuters reported.Maliki has come under mounting pressure since militants of the group now calling itself the Islamic State rampaged through swathes of the country last month and declared a mediaeval-style caliphate on land they have captured in Iraq and neighboring Syria.
"I will never give up my candidacy for the post of prime minister," Maliki said in a statement read out on state television by an announcer.
"I will remain a soldier, defending the interests of Iraq and its people," he added, in the face of what he called terrorists and their allies.
Maliki's statement will complicate the struggle to form a new government to unite the ethnically and religiously divided country, something parliament failed to achieve this week. It extends a political deadlock made all the more dangerous by the pressing threat to Iraq's territorial integrity.
Accused by his critics of exacerbating the country's sectarian split, Maliki has come under immense pressure to step down from his Sunni and Kurdish political foes, and even from some in his own Shi'ite camp. In pointed comments in a Friday sermon read by an aide, the country's leading Shi'ite cleric said parliament's inability to form a new government at its first session was a "regrettable failure".
| The span of governance for a prime minister in a democratic / semi-democratic state rarely exceeds ten years. Your positives plateau, your negatives accumulate. At some point you either lose an election, step down or get shoved to one side. It's about time for Maliki to get a shove. |