US President George W. Bush on Tuesday noted some "frustration" with political leaders in Baghdad, but said it was up to Iraqi voters whether to replace Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.
"There's a certain level of frustration with the leadership in general," Bush said after two senior US lawmakers called on Iraq's parliament to remove Maliki's government if it fails to make progress on political reconciliation.
"The fundamental question is, will the government respond to the demands of the people? And if the government doesn't respond to the demands of the people, they will replace the government. That's up to the Iraqis to make that decision, not American politicians," he said.
Senators Carl Levin, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and John Warner, the panel's top Republican, said Monday after a two-day visit to Iraq that they were not optimistic about the prospects for compromise.
"We believe that the recent high-level meetings among Iraqi political leaders could be the last chance for this government to solve the Iraqi political crisis," they said in a joint statement.
"And should it fail, we believe, the Iraqi Council of Representatives and the Iraqi people need to judge the government of Iraq's record and determine what actions should be taken -- consistent with the Iraqi constitution -- to form a true unity government to meet those responsibilities."
In a teleconference with reporters, Levin said Iraqi leaders had failed to meet their own political benchmarks on sharing power and resources, modifying de-Baathification laws, scheduling provincial elections, or amending the constitution.
"So I hope that the Iraqi assembly, when it reconvenes in a few weeks, will vote the Maliki government out of office and will have the wisdom to replace it with a less sectarian and a more unifying prime minister and government," he said.
Bush insisted that his US troop escalation and security crackdown in Iraq had made it possible for what he described as a "bottom-up" political reconciliation driven by Iraq's people, not its political leaders.
"There is some progress being made," he said. "Clearly, the Iraqi government's got to do more through its parliament to help heal the wounds of having lived years under a tyrant.
"It's not easy to go from a tyrannical society where the tyrant brutalized his people and created deep suspicions into one in which people are willing to work more closely together," he said.
