Iraqi leaders reject key U.S. benchmark

BAGHDAD — Iraqi government leaders on Wednesday rejected a law that would have required nationwide elections by the fall, dealing a serious blow to a measure that the U.S. considers a key benchmark of political reconciliation in Iraq.

Parliament passed the legislation two weeks ago. The veto by Iraq's presidency council was an unexpected setback. Lawmakers will now have to reconsider the measure, which they only agreed to as part of a three-law package reached after weeks of political wrangling so divisive that some called for the dissolution of parliament. The two other laws — the 2008 budget and an amnesty that could apply to thousands of detainees in Iraqi prisons — were approved by the presidency council.

"This is a huge disappointment," said the Shiite deputy speaker of parliament, Khalid al-Attiyah, through an aide. "The political blocs all agreed on this law before. Now we will have to try to start all the deals and agreements from the beginning."

The legislation was vetoed because of the opposition of Adel Abdul-Mahdi, a Shiite vice president who sits on the three-member presidency council, which must approve all laws unanimously, according to his aides and other lawmakers. Abdul-Mahdi's aides said he believed the law was unconstitutional and would put too much control in the hands of the central government instead of the provinces.

The passage of the law, which delineated the scope of provincial powers, was considered a crucial step not just because it fleshed out the constitution's definition of Iraq as a federal state, but also because it would have required provincial elections to be held by Oct. 1. The last nationwide elections took place in 2005.

The presidency council — whose two other members are President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, and the country's second vice president, Tariq al-Hashemi, a Sunni — remains firmly committed to holding the elections by Oct. 1, according to Naseer Ani, the chairman of the panel.

But Western diplomats said they worry that most of the political parties have no incentive to make sure the elections are held, since many of them are likely to lose out to newly formed parties or those that boycotted the elections in 2005.

Gates urges Turkey to withdraw from Iraq

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates urged Turkish leaders on Wednesday to abandon their invasion of guerrilla-controlled lands in the northernmost reaches of Iraq by mid-March.

U.S. and Iraqi leaders seem increasingly worried that fighting along the Turkey-Iraq border could widen into a broader and bloodier conflict.

"It's very important that the Turks make this operation as short as possible and then leave," Gates told reporters in New Delhi on Wednesday as he prepared to leave for Turkey.

His words reflected the Bush administration's sharper tone toward the Turkish government over the cross-border raids and stood in contrast to earlier U.S. statements backing the Turks in their operations against guerrillas from the Kurdistan Workers' Party, known as the PKK, the initials of the group's name in Kurdish.

Information from The New York Times is included in this report.