BAGHDAD — Infuriated by the recent fatal shootings of four people by U.S. soldiers, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has decided to appoint a judge to hear evidence in the cases, a close aide said Sunday.
"There must be a hearing of some sort by an Iraqi judge," said Haider Abadi, a lawmaker with Maliki's Islamic Dawa Party and member of the prime minister's inner circle.
The appointment of a judge to hear evidence against U.S. soldiers would represent a significant encroachment on the rules laid down during the U.S. occupation, which provide foreigners working in the country, both military and civilian contractors, immunity from the Iraqi judicial process.
Abadi acknowledged that the judge would have no authority to convict or sentence Americans, but he said a forum is needed to provide Iraqis a sense of justice.
"It's not acceptable, Iraqis getting killed without even knowing if it is the result of a tragic incident or this is negligence on the part of the U.S. military," he said.
Abadi said he had been told the U.S. military was willing to cooperate but said he was skeptical that it would produce investigative documents or allow soldiers to testify. The military did not respond Sunday to a Times query asking whether it would participate.
The Iraqi lawmaker described the proceeding as something like an American coroner's inquest. It would allow all the evidence to be weighed in public by a judge who would decide whether there was criminal negligence.
He said he hoped the hearing would provide a way out of the impasse over immunity, which has tied up negotiations over extending the U.S. military's authorization to stay in Iraq after its United Nations mandate expires at the end of the year.
Iraqi officials have been demanding legal jurisdiction to prosecute U.S. troops and contractors for their crimes. U.S. negotiators are willing to cede jurisdiction over contractors but not military personnel.
"The Iraqi side wants to have a procedure where at least the Iraqi judiciary is respected and facts are presented so that we can arrive at a conclusion," Abadi said. "At the moment we never arrive at facts. There is an Iraqi story and an American story. We just forget about it."
Maliki reached the decision after U.S. troops searching for a suspect in Karbala province on Friday fatally shot an 18-year-old guard who was a distant relative of the prime minister.
