 Good afternoon. Thank you all very much for being with us this afternoon. It's great to have you here at the United States Institute of Peace. It's our honor to have the Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq, his Excellency Dr. Salah al-Mutlak with us here this afternoon for his remarks, also for your questions. And so we look forward to this conversation to be able to explore the many issues having to do with the Iraq, the United States, the issues that affect both of us. USIP is very pleased to have been in Iraq for 10 years. We've been there since 2004. We've never left. Good times and bad. And our work there, we think, has had an effect on the work of others, of Iraqis, trying to find peaceful resolution of disputes. We've worked with national and provincial leaders, but we've worked on the ground. The range of activities that we have undertaken is broad. We've also sponsored discussions such as this with Dr. Budlak and other senior Iraqis who have come here to the United States, here to Washington, and here to the Institute of Peace. We've worked in Nineveh, mitigating tensions. We've been building bridges between community and police in Kirkuk, in Baghdad, in Karbala, in Basra. We've got a range of activities that we are pleased with, and we've just had a conversation with the Deputy Prime Minister. We hope that this discussion today will be next in the series of further conversations. We look forward to Dr. Mutlak's remarks. The session today is in two parts. We will have the first session with Dr. Mutlak. We will also then have an intermission, and then we will have two members of the Iraqi Council of Representatives, the Iraqi Parliament. Mr. Isat Al-Shabandar and Dr. Nadia Al-Jabouri will have an opportunity to have a conversation with you, answer questions, and enter into that kind of work. Dr. Mutlak, let me invite you to come make your initial remarks, and then we will have an opportunity to discuss this later on. So please welcome the Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq, Mr. Prime Minister. Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. It's my honor to be among you today to talk about our vision on how to deal with the situation in Iraq and the region. And no doubt the Middle East now is in a very difficult time, and Iraq is part of that region. As we said before, to our brothers in the neighboring countries, don't get so excited about the sectarianism in Iraq, because if it gets to cross to your countries, it will cut your parts. And this is what's happening now, and now the whole region is suffering from sectarianism, which Iraq priorly suffered from. And we told them also that Iraq is not the only country suffering from terrorism. As you know, terrorism has no borders, and it's going to be reaching you sooner or later. And I told them to cooperate with Iraq, and the Iraqis to fight terrorism, because terrorism wherever it goes is violence, blood, and killing, and abuse, and miserable life for people. A few of them listened to us, but others did not care, and now everybody is paying the price. Today, we want to help everybody to get rid of that disease, sectarianism, and the terrorism. And we can play an important role to help the region to get rid of terrorism that we all suffering from, likewise with sectarianism. Iraqis paid a high price to fight terrorism. As you all know, that Iraqis gave a huge price and sacrifices to kick Al Qaeda out of Iraq. It was really an expensive price to pay. Cruelty and abuse and marginalization can create a rich environment for terrorism and for Al Qaeda specifically. And that's why Al Qaeda is growing again in Iraq. And now we need all the effort to come together to help Iraq to get rid of that danger, likewise in the region. I would like to emphasize that your brothers Sunnis, Shias, Kurds, and Arabs are quite determined to clean the country from sectarianism and terrorism. And they really need your help. And I'm quite sure that at the end they will be able to defeat terrorism in Iraq. So we need help from the United States and the rest of the country to fight terrorism in Iraq is greatly needed. But today we need your help also to advise, give an advice to your friend in Iraq, the head of the political groups to have a kind of reconciliation in the country. Because we believe that arming the Iraqi army is not enough by itself. Because you know, there is a society, cohesive society is needed to fight terrorism. And if you don't have these two factors, things will be really difficult. And as you know, that the American army with Ismite could not defeat Al Qaeda unless they could really have the cooperation of the local people. And that's why trying to lift up cruelty and being fair to the citizen of these regions. And this is what we need again. So I would like to emphasize again, arming the Iraq is important, but to have a national reconciliation is also as important. We are about to have an election in Iraq. We only have a very short time for elections to take place. It's going to be an important day in the history of Iraq. We need free elections to take place in Iraq with a lot of transparency, monitoring, international monitoring. We're also civil society from the international community to take part. We need elections where you don't have curfew imposed on the people. Because as you know, these two things don't go together. People won't be able to go to the polls and vote. So if a curfew is imposed, would be an attempt to marginalize some size of party not to be part of the elections or the democratic process. We noticed what happened in the provincial council's elections when some neighborhoods were forbidden to participate by imposing curfew. Then the participation rate was very low. And I think this is very dangerous. And the political representation would not reflect the Iraqi society equally. And it will put obstacles on the way of the political process in Iraq. Sectarianism is really a danger threatening Iraq. I would say it's more important than terrorism because it is the base for terrorism. So now hearing some loud voice, sectarian voice, it's just a way to undermine the efforts for a free and good elections. And it's going to harm the country greatly. And I wish you to give an advice to all of you friends, people, you know, not to escalate sectarianism in Iraq, whether before or after the election. And I think there is like a kind of fever for escalation of sectarianism taking place now in Iraq. And this is very dangerous. And there is also some people using some of the problems and exaggerate them to also help sectarianism to grow bigger. And I wish for everybody to distance themselves from that topic because it represents a great danger on our country and our democracy. I have other commitments and might be able to spend much time, so let's go for questions and answers. And if there's something you would like to ask me, I'll be glad to answer. And if you don't have any questions, then I would expand and explain more. Thank you for these moments. And Saeed. To get those words out, we noticed that you also wrote these words down this morning. And they appeared in the Wall Street Journal editorial op-ed in that paper where you laid out some of those issues as well. You come from Anbar. Can you give us a little sense of the issues that you spoke about just now so eloquently in terms of sectarianism in Anbar and the situation on the ground in Fallujah in Ramadi. You mentioned al-Qaeda, sectarianism as a threat even larger than terrorism. Could you elaborate on that a little bit, please? I lived the situation in Anbar and I made continuous contact with what's taking place in Anbar. Al-Qaeda and ISIS, they're in Anbar and Mosul, Diyarah, Baghdad and even other southern provinces. And I think they have greater presence now in the last few months. They represent danger, but the greater danger is when the society will just step aside and don't take its role in fighting terrorism and fighting al-Qaeda. And this is exactly what I'm talking about, taking place in Fallujah and Ramadi. And we're talking also about the uprise taking place on these areas as a very minor. Those people who are uprising are the former military officers and soldiers in the army and some of them bathists. A lot of people also, they were in demonstration for a whole year asking for their constitutional rights which was never fulfilled, their demands. And we cautioned everybody that not complying with their demands, with the people's demand in a peaceful way would cause them and push them to gain their demands fulfilled in a different way using violence. Fulfilling these demands democratically within a year would avoid them going to use the other alternative. So we talk to everybody, don't really disappoint the demonstrators because you would push them to be extremists. Give them the space to express themselves peacefully in a democratic way. So the army went there to fight al-Qaeda in Ambar. The Iraqis were greeting them, they were on their side. But when the goal derailed to be instead of against al-Qaeda, to become against the demonstrators, then the people had a change of heart. And people started to demonstrate differently now. It's important to say that let Iraqis get unified to fight terrorism. Don't separate or marginalize people willingly because separating them or isolating them will undermine the military's efforts to fight terrorism. It's okay to arm the Iraqi army, but parallel we want to have people have the complete satisfaction and that they want to fight terrorism as well with the people also. People's will is to be going parallel with the army's will. This way all Iraqis will be unified against terrorism. Don't make these provinces or regions to be incubators for al-Qaeda because they would feel that their dignity is touched and hurt and then they will turn their back to you and they won't fight al-Qaeda. This is a great danger. And we need the people to fight terrorism and sectarianism unified with the army in the same direction to fight these two. People have some feeling that they've been, some of the people have had feelings that they've been marginalized and they're not getting their rights. So this is one country and you have to give everybody their rights and if there's no stability there won't be any development and there's no development. No one would be happy to see Iraq going through these circumstances whether U.S. or everybody is around the world. It's important for everybody else to cooperate to create a stabilized country, a stable country fighting sectarianism where there's no distinction or somebody would be marginalized and the other are given the chance to work. And we want for all the sects to have their role unified in the Iraqi society. We know in the leadership of the army of Iraq does not have a realistic representation of the composition of the Iraqi population. And there is something wrong. It's imbalanced. The state is imbalanced and we need to them to get to be stabilized and balanced again so that people would have a belief that their leadership is representing everybody equally. And when people feel that they are equal with the other they don't mind whether for their prime minister to be from this sect or another as far as they are doing their goals. If I understand you correctly it would be possible for the people of Anbar, the Iraqis to unite to oppose al-Qaeda and that weapons from the United States and recognition of the importance of dignity of the people of Anbar and the people of Iraq more broadly that combination you said in parallel both the support from the United States on the military side as well as encouraging this dialogue, this national reconciliation. So the weapons though would be part of that but not the only part of that. Exactly. Weapons alone cannot do the job. It is important but cannot do the job. We have to go in parallel to shrinking the Iraqi army plus creating the reconciliation in the country and giving the rise to the people who ask for the rise for almost more than a year. You mentioned the elections, elections coming up. You had several qualifications and several concerns about the conduct of those elections and the ability of all Iraqis to participate in those elections. If there are free and fair elections what do you see coming out of those? An ability of a government to be able to come together named more quickly than last time coalitions forming if the elections are well conducted freely and fairly. What kind of an Iraqi government would you like to see coming out of those elections? Look, I think there was a mistake which happened during the past election. Iraqis were supposed to take the chance to form the government because it won 91 seats against 89 seats but because of the pressure from Iran and because the United States did not act in a strong way things went in the wrong way and in my feeling without finding a national project, a national list, a national coalition which will be away from sectarianism this country will not be stabilized and it will not be kept united. So if there is a transparent election and fair election which till now I cannot see I think there will be a fair representation of the people and things will go in a proper way but if there will be a curfew during the election and people will be prevented from going to the election to elect and if the sectarian speech will continue the results will be not promising neither for the Iraqis nor for those who likes Iraq. In the last election as you say there were several lists. One list as you mentioned was non sectarian, multi sectarian. Do you see that, will that happen again in this election? I think even the sectarian parties they split now they are not in one list. There is a possibility of forming a semi nationalist list in the future. Providing again the election will go in a fair and transparent one and there is a supervision on this election. One of the questions from the audience asks about the government formation following an election. This is from Mark Dewever. Is it likely that government formation will take as long as it did the last time? And if so what are the implications for the security of Iraq during that period of time of government formation? I cannot predict really but it's more likely it will take time. With the split of these lists it will take some time. Staying on elections, another question from the audience, from Eric Gofteson from Epic. How much of a role is foreign funding playing in Iraqi politics leading up to the election today? This is a good question. I think one of the problems that we are facing now is that corruption in the country and also foreign aiding is going to play a big role in the results of the elections. I hope this will not be as much as people are expecting because in the governorate election it played a big role. So at this time it will play a role but to which extent I hope it will not be that much but again corruption is very high in this country and it will affect the results definitely. You mentioned both in your Wall Street Journal piece as well as your remarks Dr. Mudlak, Al-Qaeda. What are the dynamics in Anbar and the dynamics with Syria that lead to the resurgence of Al-Qaeda in Iraq at this point? Well the borders are open and they are so long so you know the elements of Al-Qaeda are moving from one place to the another one. So definitely solving the problem of Syria would do its effect in Iraq but we cannot wait until that time. I think and I'm sure that the people of Al-Anbar by the help of the other people if there is a guarantee that they are going to be supported they are able to remove Al-Qaeda from Al-Anbar. But again if justice is not going to be there there will be a spread of violence everywhere in Iraq and I just want my friends to remember that the violence is not only in Al-Anbar. The problem in Diyala is even worse than in Al-Anbar. There are people who are being displaced from their areas to other areas and that is in a continuous way. This has to be stopped also. What's happening in Diyala will be reflected to Al-Anbar, to Baghdad and to the others. And what we see in Baghdad is also a huge problem. It's not less than or higher than what's happening in Al-Anbar. It is a must now that we should create the stability. If we create the stability we'll find development. We'll find jobs for the people. But if not this will continue and even if we defeat Al-Qaeda in that place then maybe we will face Al-Qaeda somewhere else. We need a complete solution, a solution in which all the Iraqis will gather together by gathering their politicians and the problem is not within the Iraqis themselves. The problem is between the politicians of Iraq. I cannot see that there are differences between the Shi'at and the Sunnis to the extent that they'll fight each other. But the problem is between the politicians and the politicians that use sectarianism just before the election in order to get votes. But this is going to be very dangerous to the country if we use it between time and time every day and the governorate election we are using that and the general election we are using that so and every two years we'll have a problem of raising sectarianism again. Do the people of Iraq support that sectarianism? Do the people of Iraq want to see that kind of conflict among their their leaders or are their leaders misjudging the Iraqis and their and their appeal to sectarianism in preparation for election leading up to elections as you just said? You know I could tell you that I'm definite in saying that the sectarianism is not among the Iraqis. Sectarianism is among the politicians but they can use it to agitate people by creating some problems at a specific time just before the election to move the people emotionally towards a specific line. So if the Iraqi politicians running for office perceived that their constituents whether they be Sunni, Shia or Kurdish actually would support a multi sector a multi sectarian party or reject more broadly the sectarianism that you said would that lead them? Would a government resulting from that kind of an election be able to pull all of Iraq together? If there will be a fair election and there will be enough contribution from all the sects in the country all the constituency in the country I think we might reach after some time a national project but if there be an oppression on specific constituents not to move to the election then this will create more imbalance in the political process and more damage and more sectarianism but it would be better of course if people will elect with that regardless of the sects but with the propaganda that some of the politicians are using before the election it's hard to see that at this moment. So you would call for Iraqi politicians not to appeal to sectarianism? Definitely and I want everybody to call them to call them not to go for sectarianism because it's really damaging to the country maybe they will win in the election maybe they will take power in the government but they cannot govern they cannot run the country in a proper way because they already made the damage before forming the government and they cannot run a government or run a country with such kind of damage. Dr. Malak there are implications as you've already indicated of the Syrian conflict for terrorism al-Qaeda support in Iraq. We're approaching the Geneva 2 conference. Iraqis have a great interest I would imagine in that resolution what advice what guidance what would you like to see coming out of the Geneva discussions? Well of course what's happening in Syria is annoying everybody and it is a disastrous way if you consider how many people are being killed how many people are being displaced it's a disaster so I would rather like to see that the opposition will be more reasonable and come and sit down and create a dialogue and get out of the situation with the minimum damage that might happen to the country. I would also like to see the Russian and the Americas will come to agreement before they go there because I think most of the complication is you know it's an outside. Some of the opposition are getting support and advices from some foreign countries and also the complication between the Russian position and the American position is making the whole situation more complicated. Dr. Malak another question here on the Kurdistan region of Iraq Alex Ebsari asked the Kurdistan region of Iraq is safe, secure and prosperous and has been spared from the violence by and large. What role can the Kurds play in combating the ISIS in Anbar province? The Kurds are doing a good job in combating al-Qaeda and ISIS in their region but they are not doing much in the other regions of Iraq. All of us would expect some more help from the Kurdish area to stop the infiltration of al-Qaeda to inside Iraq and also to take some measures to stop them from coming there. But their main concern now is their region. I don't think they are playing a big role in defeating al-Qaeda in the other places. Sam Kazan at CSIS asks a question about history here. You asked for America's help to fight terrorism. Last November Prime Minister Maliki visited Washington, sat right here where you're sitting and made a similar request. If America's assistance is so central to Iraq's effort against extremism, why was the status of forces agreement not extended at the end of 2011? This is a historical question I said. It happened. It did. So now are you responsible about what's going on in Iraq? Do you want to feel that you have to participate or you just say that okay you didn't want us there, we are out and we are not responsible anymore? I think you have a legal and moral responsibility towards Iraq because Iraq was a united country. You came to remove Saddam's regime, a dictatorship regime to the worst democracy and in fact instead of doing that you destroyed a country, not only the regime. Not only regime, Mr. Zalmai is here, Karasim. So therefore Iraq in my opinion will stand up at some time and get rid of what's going on now. But what is needed from you and for the world and from the world in general is to help Iraq to stand as soon as possible in a shorter time so that the the facts, the damages will be less. And again I feel it is the responsibility of the world who decided to invade Iraq at that time to stand for Iraq and help Iraq in such a moment. And at least by the advice to your friends in the political process to tell them look we are being blamed for changing the regime there we want the real democracy to be established there not the democracy we see now. So work together and for those whom you have given them more than what they should get you should tell them now let's look you went too far stop here and sit with you with your brothers and solve the problem in a peaceful way. Otherwise if the Kurdish parties will expand from one side and the other sect will extend from other side then by that way the problem is not going to be solved. What happened in Iraq was done by an external power and I think the external power is still needed to rearrange things especially for those whom you have given more than they should get. So this is a this is a good question for all of us here in Washington the kinds of support that you are looking for from the United States you've already mentioned sale of weapons not by themselves but certainly the sale of the weapons advice to the government on inclusive advice and expectation of free and fair elections what other advice would you give us what other requests would you make of the of the United States of the US government? Look sale of weapons in parallel with the reconciliation because again I don't think the weapons alone can solve the problem the major problem is that there is no reconciliation in the country if there is a reconciliation maybe we need weapons but the weapon we need may be much less than what we need now so these two things has to go together do not concentrate on one aspect and leave the other aspect do not neglect the other aspect because still I think inclusive government I mean sharing of power in this government include in you know the presence of all the component and the security decision and the security organization is a must now the whole security issue is linked to one party and this should stop and there should be an organization which run the security part not a person not a party your president is the command general of the army isn't it commander in chief the army yeah but he can he does not take the decision alone there is an organization who tells him okay this should be done we need such an organization Deputy Prime Minister Jin Suk Lee from NBC Korea asks this question do you think life under Prime Minister Maliki is better than life under Saddam Hussein if so what are the grounds that you would say so well definitely life in a democratic system is better than life in a dictatorship system but will you tell me that life now is prosperous and good I tell you no that brings the question that brings us around to some questions of economics one of the questions here is the the energy relations between Baghdad and Erbil have been the source of some concern some interest on the part of of your neighbors how would you describe those energy relations between the Baghdad and and the Kurdish I do not agree with any decision which is going to be taken or taken now to export oil without the agreement of the central government because this will disintegrate Iraq there is a question here that has to do with a a law that was recently passed that would have the effect of of changing the way that your government is organized are there constitutional changes that need to be made there was a constant there was a you know the history of the constitution and the and there have been suggestions that constitution ought to be changed what what kinds of changes ought to make and how would those changes come across well our constitution was written in three months time and that was a mistake and during that time we fought against that and we stood against that and our friend I think he remembers he remembers very well one day we sat together and he said look we have changed the constitution and we added the article 142 which says that there will be amendment for the constitution and for months time okay this is fair then we thought if there will be a chance to amend the constitution we will agree on this constitution then we'll amend it after four months but there is a phrase written with it it says that it needs a referendum okay but it means also that there is no rejection from three two-thirds of three governorates I told my friend Mr. Zalmayla look this means there is no amendment for the constitution because the constitution was written for the benefit of a specific region that was a clear and these three governorates will reject any changes in the constitution so it means this is a dead constitution you know we cannot change it then the committee was established after some time and they said for almost more than six years now no eight years and no six years yes and nothing changed the constitution so unless this constitution is going to be changed amended we are in a problem now if there is a disagreement between the central government and any region the decision is for the region not for the central government and that means that there is no united country really so unless this and other matters are going to be amended we still in a problem and there are some some art some some matters in the constitution that is not clear people uh someone uh understood it in a way the other one in the other way so it's always making a conflict we voted against the constitution and uh we collected at that time five million people signature to vote against the constitution but the constitution passed and now if you ask mr marikey do you agree with this constitution do you want it he will say no this constitution is a problem if you ask the other politicians accept the course they will say yes this constitution has to be changed but how can we change it again this is the influence of your politicians to tell those whom you helped at that time for some reasons let's look the only way is to sit with your brothers in the country and rearrange things again because you have taken more than you should at some time there was a line uh 32 you moved more than that this is a problem also you have to solve it with your own you know country dr marikey uh joseph shivald from uh the msi tarabat project asks this question speaking of laws uh a revised law 21 parliament recently passed revised law 21 uh with much stronger language supporting decentralization where the ministry is receptive to the revision and have you seen them take any practical steps forward since its passage there is a conflict towards that article 21 and maybe it will be revised again because it gave too much authority to the governorate too much decentralization while these governorates probably they are not ready for that they are not you know equipped with enough professional people to run the governorate at this time at these sometimes before we go in such a step but the law is still there another set of negotiations we talked about the jeneva negotiations uh the negotiations on iranian policy on iranian nuclear policy have moved along we're now into the implementation phase of that interim agreement do you see any changes any uh strategic changes in the approach that the iranian government is taking toward foreign policy international relations dealing with their neighbors in particular with iraq what what do you see any of that kind of change coming from your neighbor well i think the negotiations are still going on if you ask me do you see any changes in the where the iranian gm are dealing with iraq is there something different from last year or the previous time no i don't see any change so no uh no recalibration no new structure no new policies that would affect no okay staying with broader discussions developments in the wider region in egypt in libya in tunisia these arab springs that some like in tunisia seem to still be on track others like in egypt seem to be off track libya is still working how does this affect iraq what do iraqis think about we in iraq at least we the the secular the liberal the nationalist people in iraq are very happy about what's happened in what happened in in egypt and we think that the egyptians they they awaken up in a shorter time otherwise they would have paid a bigger price because we we have the experience in iraq that this is the slamest movement will never create the stability in any country because it will definitely lead to sectarianism and sectarianism will will disintegrate any country that it exists in and we hope for the egyptian to move forward and if the egyptian will win this time and i think they will win i think this will reflect itself on the other arab countries egypt will have a big effect on on others in the region on iran um gerald chandler um asked if iran has a nuclear bomb will there be an arms race will saudi arabia uh pursue a nuclear weapon well if iran is going to have the the tambourine why shouldn't so the arabia stop definitely is going to be a struggle in the area and we want a cleaner area we don't want to struggle towards you know that kind of problem brian humphreys from rector's university asked this question does the iraqi army have legitimacy in anbar frequently you hear it referred to as the maliki forces how will it be possible to fight al qaeda without support of the people for the army al al qaeda cannot be defeated without the help of the people in anbar no matter how big the army is there must be a cooperation between the people of al anbar and other provinces and the army if you ask me is there a distance now between the army and the people i would say yes and i hope this distance will be shortened as soon as possible friend of yours mark kimit um asks this question how much of the violence sponsored by regional neighbors fighting a proxy war how much is the violence from lack of reconciliation if i have an information that you know what's happening in iraqi is being supported by foreign country i will tell you i don't have any information of that but definitely the lack of reconciliation is the problem of an increasing al qaeda existence in or a presence in iraqi doctor prime minister um several people are asking about sectarianism you've made some very strong statements clear statements on that but beyond sectarianism a qi isis beyond those issues what would be on your platform for this election coming up your policies your policy agenda for the block that you would put together i will fight sectarianism and isis and al qaeda in the same time sectarianism and al qaeda are both a danger to iraq and to the region and it has to be fought by every honest and decent person in this region and that's the main main issue for you in these upcoming elections what are there other issues that were no i will ask for also amend the amendment of the constitution as you mentioned i will ask for more inclusive government i will ask for justice and this in the coming government in the country and when you have justice i think the iraqis could live together in an appropriate way uh adel sanly from iac asks this question what do you think of the religious parties um in iraq do you believe in separation of religion and policy they say or religion in the state of course i mean this is uh this is my platform you like these easy questions that the you like easy questions well she retired military asks is he here i'm sure he's here he wrote this uh yes what is needed internally uh to move iraq toward genuine national reconciliation we've we've had some of this discussion already he he goes on to ask what can the us do to help that general national reconciliation and what legal obligations do you you believe the united states has to iraq and you have uh you have raised this issue as well but uh but rick wilts asked that question again i think he worked in this subject for a long time in iraq at reconciliation he knows what is needed in iraq and he knows that there is an obligation he studied law i think he knows that there is an obligation a legal application for the uh americans towards iraq if it's not going to be raised now it will be raised some other times and i hope we will not go to that extent i hope that the uh cooperation between america and and iraq will continue in order to solve the problems that's been created we don't want to go to the past and concentrate on it let us look for the future and how could america and iraq work together to stop violence to make inclusive government to make a fair and justice in iraq and i know that your rule now is different from your rule before i know that you are limited in your you know power towards the government and the politicians but still you have you have a relation with some of your partners that you work with for such a long time they need you and you need them and you could form a you know a source of cooperation in order to fix the problems we are talking about and fixing that those problems are not that big issue actually if i am in the others position i will do it right away i will lose nothing i will keep myself in power but i will let the other people be pleased nothing is going to be lost nothing lost uh michael keith um asked this question you mentioned weapons play an important role and you've emphasized not the only role um how would the government of iraq employ these weapons without further aggravating sectarian divides that is is there do you have any concerns about the use of these weapons that the united states might provide weapon is being used before united states has supplied the weapon and this has to be stopped right away weapon has to be used against a civilian and this has to be forbidden michael albin of the library of congress asked this question does the road to reconciliation lead through iran who asked this question michael albin where is michael michael is there michael that's the you know the answer don't you next question i take that to live a hub al hiti uh independent asks this question would you approve worldwide sanctions on the iraqi government due to corruption leading to that leads to terrorism uh we suffered a lot from the sanction so i don't want to repeat that on iraq but i think this question is a very important one i need the voices to be raised to the all politicians in in iraq to sit down and make reconciliation otherwise steps will be taken unspecified steps but there would there should be there should be consequences i mean i cannot say which step now is going to be taken but i would say that some measures are going to be taken because the absence of reconciliation in the country would affect not only iraq to an extent to the other regions let me ask you the the last question or the give you an opportunity at the end here i think you've been very generous with your time and i know you've got appointments on congress on on capitol hill and those are very important don't want to keep you from that but um when you look out you see the elections coming up let's assume that they are are good ones as in the ways that you've described what what kind of an iraq what does your country look like in two three four years if if you can look that far and make make a not necessarily a prediction but even a hope an expectation well i always hope that my country will be kept united and that the people of iraq will live together in a peaceful way as we always live uh i assure you that we never thought of sectarianism in our in our country we used to live in one room in the offices in the field and the factories but we don't know who is shia aton who is this this is only that was only created after 2003 i hope that we will go to those days in which we enjoyed our life in a in a in a nice environment nice country although we suffered from the section from dictatorship but uh we live together in a proper way and you know the intermarriage between the city and the shia he will be surprised at 25 percent yes and i'm among them we're very glad that your wife is here deputy prime minister we are very pleased that you've been able to join us i want to thank you very much for that we will have an opportunity in a moment i will take a brief intermission and we will invite your colleagues from the council of representatives to to join my colleague sarang have a seat who will lead that discussion but in let me just take this opportunity to thank you and ask the audience to join me in thanking you for your time here today