Brian Katulis on the Iraq Elections

Why hasn't there been a winner yet in the Iraq elections?

The Iraqi election system is complicated. It's a parliamentary system, and it's produced a set of parties, none of whom got the magic number. In Iraq the magic number is 163. You need 163 seats, which is a majority, in the 125-seat parliament to form a government. And at this stage you've got four different players in Iraq, four different main parties, that are negotiating how to get to that 163. The largest coalition has 91 seats, and it's looking to negotiate with a number of different potential partners. But as in European countries and many other countries that have parliamentary systems, this could take some time. In Iraq the last time it took about five and a half months for a government to form. So we may be looking at a summer without a formal Iraqi government in place, and a caretaker government in a situation that is very volatile in terms of the security situation, and in a region that is deeply important to U.S. strategic interests.

Which main parties are likely to emerge as part of the new government?

Well, right now there are two main parties that have the upper hand. One is Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's State of Law party. They won about 89 seats. They were narrowly beaten out by Ayad Allawi, another former prime minister of Iraq, who won about 91 seats. So those are the two leading contenders at this point among the main political forces. There are two other main forces that come into this complicated equation. One are the Kurds. The Kurds have about 40 seats. And the second is a list called the INA, which is mostly a Shiite list. So at this state it's deeply uncertain in terms of who will actually become the prime minister. And what we're seeing right now is a negotiation, mostly among political elites, about who's gonna get which seat. These negotiations sometimes touch upon the issues related to broader questions in Iraq that have not been resolved, like the oil law, the dispute over Kirkuk and other disputed territories. But I suspect that these negotiations will go on for weeks, perhaps even months, before we a clear idea of who's going to emerge.

How will the outcome affect U.S. policy toward Iraq?

At this stage, U.S. policy in Iraq is guided by two agreements with the Iraqi government. One is a security agreement that outlines a timetable for U.S. troop redeployment. U.S. troops are supposed to be completely out of Iraq by the end of 2011. That agreement also governs how U.S. forces operate within Iraq. The second agreement is a strategic framework agreement, which details a very comprehensive set of bilateral plans for economic cooperation, cultural, and educaton cooperation. So even while Iraqis are still trying to decide who is the head of their new government, these agreements are in place and the governments of Iraq and the United States are working on this bilateral relationship together. Who emerges as the next prime minister really, I think, is an important question that so far the United States has remained neutral on, and I think it needs to stay mostly neutral. But depending on what type of prime minister and set of leaders emerge inside of Iraq, we will be looking at an Iraq that is either more closely aligned to the rest of the Arab Middle East or leaning a little bit more towards Iran and towards the East. My hope is that the new Iraq that emerges, the new Iraqi government, can help serve as a bridge between the Arab world and Iran and help de-escalate some of the tensions inside of the region.