Word: syrian
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...join the INA but wanted his Dawa Party to receive a majority of the block's parliament seats and to be guaranteed a return to the premiership. No deal. So Maliki decided to gamble on his own prowess, forming a new coalition he touts as nationalist (condemning alleged Syrian support for terrorism in Iraq and promoting a strong central government) as well as anti-sectarian (digs at the INA, which is led by clerics with strong ties to neighboring Iran...
...Syria, changing the face of the capital, Damascus, with their clothing, accents and shell-shocked appearances. Years later, many of the 1.5 million Iraqis remaining in Syria have become a part of the fabric of life. Many own homes or businesses and have children who speak Arabic with a Syrian accent. But one sector of the immigrant population still feels ill at ease: the 400,000 or so Iraqis with ties to the former regime of Saddam Hussein...
...Former Iraqi Baathists in Syria have become the subject of an escalating dispute between the Iraqi and Syrian governments that began when suicide bombers blew up government buildings in Baghdad in August, killing 95 people. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki blamed the bombings on former Baathists in Syria and accused Damascus of harboring and supporting groups that are orchestrating attacks in Iraq. Syria denied the allegations and offered to turn over any suspects in the bombings if Iraq could provide evidence of their guilt. A standoff ensued, dampening the slowly warming relations between the two countries and putting cooperation...
...Syria is not about to hand over former Baathists for prosecution, either. Syrian officials point out that their country protected many members of the current Iraqi government when they were exiled by Saddam, including Maliki himself, who spent 20 years in Damascus. "There are [now] 1.5 million Iraqi refugees in Syria," Fayssal Mekdad, Syria's Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs tells TIME. "When they came here we didn't ask them what party they belonged to. We just opened our doors...
...former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, father of the Prime Minister-designate. As the Obama Administration has reached out, Syria has made progress on some of the outstanding points of contention between the two countries. It has for the first time officially recognized Lebanese sovereignty, by opening a Syrian embassy in Beirut. (Damascus has traditionally viewed Lebanon as a Syrian province turned into a separate country by European colonial powers.) And it has made some effort to stem the flow of militants across the Syrian border into Iraq. Still, Syria appears wary of giving away too much and is especially...