Meanwhile... a storm of another kind is brewing in Baghdad. The rift between Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and the country's new president came to full view on Monday... when President Fouad Massoum nominated the deputy parliament speaker as the new prime minister, and asked *him to form a new government... a request Maliki had hoped would be directed to him.
Prime Minister Maliki's Dawa Party rejected the nomination of his successor... as the embattled Iraqi leader deployed elite security forces to secure main avenues in Baghdad, as hundreds of his supporters held a rally.
Washington has directly thrown its support behind President Massoum. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry from Sydney warned Prime Minister Maliki against a use of force in "this moment of democracy for Iraq."
