BAGHDAD — Iraqi lawmakers overcame weeks of deadlock Wednesday to pass three key measures: a $48-billion national budget, an amnesty bill and legislation paving the way for provincial elections by Oct. 1.
Approval of the bills could signal a greater willingness by Iraq's main ethnic and religious factions to overcome differences that have stymied political progress. Lawmakers said the measures would generate economic development and could speed the return of Sunni Arab ministers who walked out of the Shiite Muslim-led government.
Analysts cautioned, however, that Iraqi leaders remained deeply divided on key issues, including the distribution of Iraq's massive oil wealth and the future of disputed territories such as oil-rich Kirkuk.
"These are issues that go to the heart of the differences between Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds," said Joost Hilterman, Middle East director for the International Crisis Group. "We are far from out of the tunnel."
Even as many Iraqi politicians celebrated a package of bills they said would foster reconciliation, some Sunni and Shiite representatives had walked out in a huff over certain clauses and the decision to hold one combined vote on the three measures.
At a news briefing in Baghdad, U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker acknowledged that many challenges remained, but said the bills passed Wednesday were "important steps forward."
"These are difficult issues," he said. "They required a lot of effort, a lot of compromise."
U.S. diplomats and military officials, who fear bloodshed could rise if the main Iraqi factions cannot agree on power-sharing arrangements, had been pushing leaders for months to take advantage of security gains to make progress on the political front.
"I'm encouraged by the fact that, in the last 24 hours, the Iraq central government has passed three laws that have been a big challenge," Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a congressional hearing Wednesday. "That's a lot of progress [and] the security environment having gotten better put them in a position to be able to do that."
The bills passed Wednesday must still be approved by Iraq's presidency council, comprising the president and two vice presidents, and questions remain about how they will be implemented.
The vote came after a stormy session that ended in the walkout by dozens of legislators and highlighted the lingering suspicions among the country's majority Shiites, the ethnic Kurds and the Sunni Arab minority that was favored under Saddam Hussein's regime.
