Progress in Iraq extremely disappointing: US ambassador

BAGHDAD: Iraqi political progress has been "extremely disappointing," the US ambassador in Baghdad said on Tuesday two weeks before he and the top American military commander in Iraq are to report to Congress.   

"Progress on national level issues has been extremely disappointing and frustrating to all concerned... to us, to Iraqis, and to the Iraqi leadership itself," Ambassador Ryan Crocker told reporters in Baghdad.   

"I would suggest that... before you get meaningful reconciliation that does not just involve leaders but is phased down to society, that is going to take time," he added.   

Crocker and General David Petraeus, the top US commander in Iraq, are expected to report to the US Congress by mid-September on the progress of their efforts to halt sectarian violence and return Iraq to viable self-governance.   

Washington's envoy told reporters that the overall level of sectarian killing has come down, although he conceded that "there are spectacular car bomb attacks".   

"What has been happening in the last couple of years... violence, population shift, displacement, tens of thousands of Iraqis killed. We are not just going to overcome that in a few weeks' time," said Crocker.   

He said the US is continuing to support Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's leadership "as it makes serious effort to achieve national reconciliation".   

"It's not just the issue of the prime minister, it's the whole government that has to perform here... our support is not a blind cheque," Crocker, however, added.   

Maliki has called a political summit in an attempt to rescue his crumbling national unity government, which has been hit by walkouts by key political blocs, including the main Sunni group the National Concord Front.   

Last weekend the prime minister went into a huddle with leaders of the country's deeply divided communities to draw up an agenda and a guest list for his summit, a date for which has yet to be determined.   

Playing down the importance of benchmarks the US government has set to determine progress in Iraq, Crocker said whether they were met or not would not adequately reflect the reality on the ground.   

"The benchmarks are important, no question about it -- important as a measure for us... but they do not tell the whole story of Iraq," he said.   

"In my view, failure to meet any of them does not mean a definitive failure of state or society, and to meet them will not mean they have turned the corner... and there is peace and harmony. It's a lot more complex."   

Legislative benchmarks were even more complicated, he added.   

"These are complicated issues," Crocker said, referring to delays in passage of key laws through parliament relating to the division of oil revenues and a review of the de-Baathification process that sacked former officials of the Saddam Hussein regime from high public or military office.