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The cost of Iraq’s empty promises/The Washington Institute: America is blackmailing the new Iraqi government

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Sudani’s tenure has not even reached the 30-day mark, but judging by his performance so far, there is little that can be described as success (or even the hint of it). Unless something changes, Iraqis are facing three more years of empty words and politics as usual.

Less than a month after being inaugurated as Iraq’s prime minister, Mohammed Shiaa Al Sudani is already reneging on promises he made to secure his governing coalition. The longer these pledges go unmet, the longer Iraq’s destabilising political polarisation will persist.

To elect a president and form a cabinet, Sudani’s pro-Iran Shia political bloc, the Coordination Framework, needed support from the country’s Sunnis.

Sunnis traded their support for a promise that, once in power, the new prime minister would withdraw pro-Iran Shia militias, known as Popular Mobilisation Units (PMU), from Sunni-dominated provinces in the northwest. Al Sudani agreed and also vowed to issue a general pardon that would open the door for the rehabilitation of the mostly-Sunni ISIS fighters.

Neither of these promises has been kept. Pro-Iran Shia lawmakers have obstructed measures that would undermine the PMUs without disbanding them. Meanwhile, proposed legislation to reinstate a compulsory military draft, introduced as a way to deplete the pool of unemployed young men for pro-Iran militias to recruit from, has been blocked by pro-Iran Shia politicians.