“Nouri al-Maliki” on The Daily Caller

Iraq’s vice president says that Iran is “definitely” behind Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s move to jail him on terror charges, saying it is “not a coincidence” that his arrest warrant was announced the day after the last U.S. troops left Iraq. (more)

President Barack Obama has begun trying to reach military voters from the campaign trail, praising soldiers’ accomplishments and scaling back his portrayal of soldiers as wounded warriors dependent on government services. (more)

WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s long and deeply unpopular war in Iraq will be over by year’s end and all U.S. troops “”will definitely be home for the holidays,” President Barack Obama declared Friday. (more)

NAJAF, Iraq (AP) – Anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is calling the U.S., Israel, and Great Britain “common enemies” against Iraq. (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraqi lawmakers approved an agreement on Saturday that aims to bring all of Iraq’s feuding political blocs into a new government led by Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, although deep disagreements remain about the role to be played by the country’s minority Sunnis. (more)

Iraqi political leaders have reached the framework of an agreement for a new government that would end the country’s eight month-long political deadlock, a senior Iraqi official said late on Wednesday. (more)

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah on Saturday invited the leaders of Iraq’s political blocs for talks in Riyadh aimed at breaking the deadlock over the formation of a new government. (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — Al-Qaida’s front group in Iraq claimed responsibility Friday for two Baghdad bombings last week that killed at least 31 people at a government security agency and what it called an “evil” mobile phone provider. (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said the end of American combat operations Tuesday leaves his country independent and an equal to the United States and he assured his people their own security forces will protect them. (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — The nude women on the DVD cover in a Baghdad street stall say it all: Change, whether you like it or not, is afoot in Iraq. (more)

Now that the final brigade of American “combat troops” has left Iraq, analysts who supported the initial attack on the Middle Eastern country told The Daily Caller that it is still too early to tell whether the military campaign they argued for has been a success, but said they were “pleasantly surprised” by the outcome to date. (more)

The appointment of General David Petraeus to lead the American and allied forces in Afghanistan has revived claims that the surge he oversaw in Iraq succeeded.  Even President Barack Obama, who opposed the surge, is reported to have conceded, “it turned out to be a good thing” before announcing his own surge in Afghanistan. (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — The two Iraqi leaders vying to become the nation’s next prime minister will get personal pleas Sunday from Vice President Joe Biden to end their rivalry that has delayed the seating of a new government as American troops head home. (more)

After months of interruptions, the high court in Iraq finally certified the March election results thereby removing another barrier as the road to forming a government proceeds. The results stand with former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi in the lead with 91 seats and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a close second garnering 89 seats. The political jockeying will begin in earnest. There’s talk of weeks and months until the Iraqi people see that day. (more)

It appears that the certification of election results in Iraq is looming. Barring any additional roadblocks, the vote will be qualified in the coming days. Nearly three months after the Iraqi people went to the polls, is there light at the end of the tunnel? To hear Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, you’d think that everything is fine and dandy. Mr. Maliki acknowledged to the Washington Post that “violence exists, but not because the government has not been formed.” Oh really? How much longer do the people of Iraq have to wait? (more)

Every day there’s a new development in the Iraqi election dispute and more frequent, fresh attacks. “I really don’t know how it will end,” said former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi. He may not see the finish line but the U.S. military does. “We are on track with our responsible drawdown plan,” said Maj. Gen. Stephen Lanza, a U.S. military spokesman. (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq’s prime minister said Thursday his Sunni-backed rivals, who narrowly won the March election, were wasting their time trying to form a new government, a remark sure to raise tensions. (more)

The last few weeks have shown an uptick in violence throughout Iraq in comparison to the relative calm the nation has experienced over the last few years. Iraq is in far better shape but the inability to form a government over two months after the March 7 elections has given the insurgency another reason to strike. It’s also another reason that Gen. Ray Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, could delay the start of the Aug. 31 “waterfall” drawdown of 46,000 U.S. Soldiers by one month to June. A senior official in Baghdad told the Associated Press that “from a military perspective, the best way for us to maintain security is to hold as many forces on the ground until we need to redeploy them. It’s really prudent, given the political conditions are unsettled, for (Odierno) to wait as long as he can.” (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — A flurry of attacks blamed on al-Qaida defied claims by the U.S. and Iraq that they dealt the militants a severe blow by killing their two leaders last month. (more)

BAGHDAD (AP) — A man with explosives strapped to his body blew himself up in a crowd, bombers struck a southern city and gunmen sprayed fire on security checkpoints in attacks Monday that killed at least 100 people — most of them in Shiite areas — in Iraq’s deadliest day this year. (more)