Brahimi is said to have been taken off-guard by Allawi’s nomination (AFP)

WASHINGTON , May 29 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – The choice of Iyad Allawi as the prime minister of the upcoming Iraqi provisional government was forced by the United States as a fait accompli on the United Nations and the Iraqi people, a mass-circulation U.S. paper said Saturday, May 29.

"The United States ended up Friday with a choice for prime minister certain to be seen more as an American candidate than one of the United Nations or the Iraqis themselves," The New York Times said.

A senior State Department official told the daily, on condition of anonymity, that the U.S.-handpicked Iraqi body had merely ratified the U.S. selection in order to make it seem that the council had the final saying.

The Times said Allawi’s choice and his close ties with the United States came "in a country where public opinion has grown almost universally hostile to the Americans".

Allawi is the secretary general of the Iraqi National Accord, an exile group that has received funds from the Central Intelligence Agency (C.I.A.) to topple former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein.

The 25-member body opened last July its inaugural session by declaring April 9, the day U.S.-led forces rolled into Baghdad , a national holiday.

A rotating president of the U.S.-appointed council was assassinated on May 17 in a car-bomb attack on his convoy west of Baghdad .

In September 2003, Akila Al-Hashimi, a woman member of the council, was shot and died later of her wounds.

Washington confirmed Friday that Allawi, a Shiite, would be Iraq 's prime minister in the interim government.

"He will be the prime minister when the interim government is set up in the next two or three days," a senior Bush administration official said.

"We thought he would be an excellent prime minister. ... I think that this is going to work."

Surprised U.N. 

But the nomination of Allawi took the U.N. off-guard with conflicting statements that reflected the state of perplexity.

"When we first heard the news today, we thought that the Iraqi Governing Council had hijacked the process," a senior U.N. official told The Times.

In his initial statements, U.N. special envoy to Iraq Lakhdar Brahimi refused to discuss the selection of Allawi.

"I don't want to go back saying who is good and who is bad," he said.

But in a hint that the selection process had not gone exactly as planned, Brahimi added: "You know, sometimes people think I am a free agent out here, that I have a free hand to do whatever I want."

U.N. officials said any misgivings that Brahimi had about Allawi were all about his past association with the C.I.A. and how it will play with the Iraqi public opinion.

Furthermore, statements from the U.N. Confirmed the idea that Brahimi was merely bowing to the wishes of the others.

"Mr. Brahimi respects the decision and says he can work with this person," said Fred Eckhard, the spokesman for U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.

"This is not the way we expected this to happen, no, but the Iraqis seem to agree on this name, and if they do, Mr. Brahimi is ready to work with him," he said.

Asked what Annan's view was, his spokesman said: "The secretary general respects the decision, as I said Mr. Brahimi does. `Respect' is a very carefully chosen word."

Finally, Eckhard's office released another statement saying there should be "no misunderstanding" over the U.N. envoy's support for the premier-designate.

"Mr. Brahimi is perfectly comfortable with how the process is proceeding thus far," the statement said.

The U.N. reactions reflected that the world body is wary of appearing toeing the U.S. line.

The U.N. Security Council, which this week began negotiating a new U.S.-U.K. draft resolution for post-transition Iraq, expected that Brahimi would make public the names of the new Iraqi government as a group, not in the individual manner that Allawi's name emerged Friday, The Times said.

But council member Mahmmoud Othman tried to play down the surprising nomination of Allawi.

"We first had a meeting of the Governing Council during which we chose Allawi and then we had another one with Brahimi and ( U.S. overseer Paul) Bremer who agreed," he told Agence France -Presse (AFP) Saturday, May 29.

"It will be the same process for the appointment of the cabinet, we cannot go forward without all three parties coming to an agreement," he added.

Othman said he hoped the final line-up of the new government would be decided by Sunday, May 30, at the latest and that current Governing Council chairman Ghazi Al-Yawar was favored to take the post of president.