The Bush administration said Sunday a U.S. Senate resolution that could lead to a division of the country into sectarian or ethnic territories "would produce extraordinary suffering and bloodshed."
The unusual U.S. Embassy statement came just hours after representatives of Iraq's major political parties denounced the U.S. Senate proposal calling for a limited centralized government with the bulk of the power given to the country's Shiite, Sunni or Kurdish regions, saying it would seriously hamper Iraq's future stability.
"Our goal in Iraq remains the same: a united, democratic, federal Iraq that can govern, defend, and sustain itself," the statement said. "Iraq's leaders must and will take the lead in determining how to achieve these national aspirations. ... attempts to partition or divide Iraq by intimidation, force or other means into three separate states would produce extraordinary suffering and bloodshed."
The nonbinding Senate resolution adopted last week calls for Iraq to be divided into federal regions under control of Kurds, Shiites and Sunnis in a power-sharing agreement similar to the one that ended the 1990s war in Bosnia. Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., was a prime sponsor of the measure.
The Kurds in three northern Iraqi provinces are running a virtually independent country within Iraq, while nominally maintaining relations with Baghdad. They support a formal division, but both Sunni and Shiite Muslims have denounced the proposal.
"Partition is not on the table," the U.S. statement said. "The United States fully supports the Iraqis in their efforts to achieve peace and stability."
At a news conference earlier Sunday, at least nine Iraqi political parties and party blocs representing both Shiites and Sunnis said the Senate resolution would diminish Iraq's sovereignty and called for an Iraqi law banning any division of the country along sectarian or ethnic lines.
"This proposal was based on the incorrect reading and unrealistic estimations of Iraq's past, present and future," according to the statement read by Izzat al-Shahbandar, a representative of the Iraqi National List, a secular political party, during a news conference.
"(The proposal) opposes all laws of the international community and its legitimate institutions which protect all the rights of people in self-decision, building their future and defending their unity and sovereignty," he said.
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