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Iraq Parliament Elects New Sp 12/29 09:16

   

   BAGHDAD (AP) -- Iraq's parliament on Monday elected a new speaker following 
overnight talks to break a political deadlock.

   Haibet Al-Halbousi received 208 votes from the 309 legislators who attended. 
He is a member of the Takadum, or Progress, party led by ousted speaker and 
relative Mohammed al-Halbousi. Twenty legislators did not attend the session.

   Iraq has been walking a tightrope to maintain close ties with the United 
States and neighboring Iran as tensions continue in the Middle East.

   Iraq held parliamentary elections in November but didn't produce a bloc with 
a decisive majority. By convention, Iraq's president is always Kurdish, while 
the more powerful prime minister is Shiite and the parliamentary speaker is 
Sunni.

   The new speaker must address a much-debated bill that would have the Hashd 
al-Shaabi, or Popular Mobilization Units --- an umbrella group of Iraqi Shiite 
militias largely backed by Iran --- become a formal security institution under 
the state. Iran-backed armed groups have growing political influence.

   Al-Halbousi also must tackle Iraq's mounting public debt of tens of billions 
of dollars as well as widespread corruption.