الرئيسية
Iraq's Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi has been barred from
travelling overseas, officials said on Monday, the latest development in
a political crisis shortly after US troops completed a pullout.
Hashemi
and Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlak, both Sunnis and members of
the secular Iraqiya bloc, have come under increasing pressure, with
three of the vice president's bodyguards arrested in connection with
"terrorist activity" and Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki calling for
Mutlak to be sacked.
"A five-member judicial committee has decided
to prevent Tareq al-Hashemi and a number of his guards from travelling
overseas due to issues related to terrorism," a senior security official
told AFP.
State broadcaster Al-Iraqiya TV also reported the travel ban.
Baghdad
security spokesman Major General Qassim Atta said three of Hashemi's
bodyguards were arrested for "suspected terrorist activity" on Sunday
evening, when the vice president was briefly escorted off a domestic
flight from Baghdad to the autonomous Kurdish region's capital Arbil.
Hashemi's
office on Monday lamented "intentional harassment" in the form of a
security force blockading his home for several weeks, as well as other
incidents. The statement confirmed that three of his guards had been
detained.
The latest events come after the Iraqiya bloc of Hashemi
and Mutlak said on Saturday it was boycotting parliament in protest
over the prime minister's alleged monopolising of power. The following
day, Maliki called for Mutlak to be ousted.
Lawmakers are due to consider the request on January 3, a parliament official said.
Mutlak,
who had been accused of being a supporter of Saddam's outlawed Baath
party in the run-up to March 2010 elections that he was barred from
standing in, told his own Babiliyah television channel that Maliki was
"worse than Saddam Hussein."
Iraqiya, which holds 82 seats in the
325-member parliament and controls nine ministerial posts, has not
pulled out of Iraq's national unity government.
travelling overseas, officials said on Monday, the latest development in
a political crisis shortly after US troops completed a pullout.
Hashemi
and Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlak, both Sunnis and members of
the secular Iraqiya bloc, have come under increasing pressure, with
three of the vice president's bodyguards arrested in connection with
"terrorist activity" and Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki calling for
Mutlak to be sacked.
"A five-member judicial committee has decided
to prevent Tareq al-Hashemi and a number of his guards from travelling
overseas due to issues related to terrorism," a senior security official
told AFP.
State broadcaster Al-Iraqiya TV also reported the travel ban.
Baghdad
security spokesman Major General Qassim Atta said three of Hashemi's
bodyguards were arrested for "suspected terrorist activity" on Sunday
evening, when the vice president was briefly escorted off a domestic
flight from Baghdad to the autonomous Kurdish region's capital Arbil.
Hashemi's
office on Monday lamented "intentional harassment" in the form of a
security force blockading his home for several weeks, as well as other
incidents. The statement confirmed that three of his guards had been
detained.
The latest events come after the Iraqiya bloc of Hashemi
and Mutlak said on Saturday it was boycotting parliament in protest
over the prime minister's alleged monopolising of power. The following
day, Maliki called for Mutlak to be ousted.
Lawmakers are due to consider the request on January 3, a parliament official said.
Mutlak,
who had been accused of being a supporter of Saddam's outlawed Baath
party in the run-up to March 2010 elections that he was barred from
standing in, told his own Babiliyah television channel that Maliki was
"worse than Saddam Hussein."
Iraqiya, which holds 82 seats in the
325-member parliament and controls nine ministerial posts, has not
pulled out of Iraq's national unity government.