Bush reiterates support for Maliki

KANSAS CITY, Missouri (AFP) - US President George W. Bush yesterday reaffirmed his support for embattled Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, calling him a "good man with a difficult job."

"Prime Minister Maliki's a good guy, good man, with a difficult job, and I support him," said Bush, who was seeking to dispel any sense that Washington has been distancing itself from the beleaguered government in Baghdad.

Bush appeared to fuel that feeling on Tuesday when he noted "frustration" with Maliki's administration and, without offering his usual words of support, said it was up to the Iraqis to decide whether to replace the prime minister.

Yesterday, the US president moved to change that impression even as he pleaded for patience with his unpopular strategy and confronted worries about stalled efforts in Iraq to forge national reconciliation.

"Many are frustrated by the pace of progress in Baghdad, and I can understand this," he said. "A free Iraq's not going to be perfect. A free Iraq will not make decisions as quickly as the country did under the dictatorship."

But "it's not up to the politicians in Washington, DC, to say whether he will remain in his position, that is up to the Iraqi people who now live in a democracy and not a dictatorship," he said.

That appeared to be a slap at two senior lawmakers who, after a two-day trip to Baghdad, urged Iraqis to consider replacing Maliki if he failed to make progress on passing laws seen as key to forging national unity.

The US-led security crackdown, fueled by a "surge" in US troop levels, has yet to achieve what Bush describes as its central aim: Quelling sectarian violence enough to break Iraq's legislative logjam.

But, the US president said, Iraq's central government was funneling oil revenues to its citizens even absent formal legislation governing the issue.

Bush's remarks to the Veterans of Foreign Wars group were to come one day after he noted "frustration" with Maliki's government and said that if it failed to produce results, Iraqis would replace him.

"He knows we're frustrated. Prime Minister Maliki has heard it directly from the president," said White House national security spokesman Gordon Johndroe.

At the end of a North American summit on Tuesday, Bush was asked whether Maliki had lost credibility because of his inability to forge unity among rival factions. Bush said that the Iraqi people, not their government, deserved credit for "noticeable and tangible and real" reconciliation efforts.

"The fundamental question is, will the government respond to the demands of the people? And if the government doesn't respond to the demands of the people, they will replace the government," Bush had warned.

"That's up to the Iraqis to make that decision, not American politicians," he said in Montebello, Canada.