Iraqiya Bloc ends cabinet boycott

The Iraqi Prime Minister Spokesman said ministers from Iraqiya bloc ended a cabinet boycott which began last December amid a political row with the government. "The prime minister welcomed the return of the ministers to accomplish the work of the government," Nouri Al-Maliki’s spokesman Ali Mussawi said. The bloc started to boycott the parliament and the cabinet, calling for Maliki to either respect a power-sharing deal or quit. Authorities have charged Vice President Tareq Al-Hashemi, an Iraqiya member, of running a death squad. Since then, the Vice President has been hiding in the autonomous Kurdistan region in north Iraq, and the authorities  so far declined to hand him over. Maliki also said his deputy Saleh Al-Mutlak, also an Iraqiya member, should be sacked after saying that he is "worse than Saddam Hussein."