Obama's awareness of the dangers of these unresolved issues prompted him to dispatch Biden on the mission, the official said. Biden told Maliki that if Iraq "actually reverts to violence, then that would change the nature of our engagement."
Asked whether Iraq was amenable to U.S. offers of help, the official, who requested anonymity, said: "The short answer we got was, 'Yes, we do want your help, and on some very specific issues.' "
Dabbagh, however, said those issues concern commerce and development, not politics. "On reconciliation, no. We feel Iraqis can do it by themselves, as it is an Iraqi issue," he said.
Whether they can is another question. Though violence levels have fallen dramatically, most of the political disputes dividing Iraqis are no closer to being resolved than they were six years ago, after the U.S.-led invasion ousted Hussein. The staunchly pro-American Kurdish minority, which fears that it will be marginalized as U.S. forces withdraw, would welcome the Obama administration's involvement in mediating these disputes, especially those concerning the borders of Kurdistan, said Kurdish legislator Mahmoud Othman.
Biden's visit indicates "that America is not going to abandon Iraq, which is a good thing," he said. But, he added, "if Iraqis themselves are not ready to reconcile, I don't think Joe Biden can do it for them."
Yet others questioned whether the vice president, who made numerous visits to Iraq as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was a good choice for Obama's special envoy to Iraq given his past support of a controversial plan to divide the country into Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni cantons.
The proposal "would have led to the partition of Iraq, to bloodshed and wars between the sects over borders and resources, to the persecution of minorities and all kinds of problems," said Sunni Arab lawmaker Osama Nujaifi, who added that he hoped Biden had since set that plan aside. "But I have my doubts," he said.
Dabbagh said the Iraqi government is confident that Biden has abandoned the plan, and that it was not raised in his meetings with Iraqi officials.
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liz.sly@latimes.com
Times staff writers Raheem Salman and Saif Hameed contributed to this report.
