Iraqi president asks Maliki to form government

BAGHDAD, Apr 22 (Reuters) Iraqi President Jalal Talabani asked Shi'ite politician Jawad al-Maliki to head postwar Iraq's first full-term government today, after four months of deadlock.

''I would like to inform the brothers and sisters that we decided unanimously to endorse our dear brother Nouri Jawad al-Maliki to head the cabinet,'' Talabani said in parliament.

Maliki, who was the ruling Shi'ite Alliance's nomination for prime minister, is a decisive and tough figure who now faces the challenge of forming a national unity government seen as the best way of averting a sectarian civil war.

It will be a sensitive task, especially when it comes to the strategic, Shi'ite-dominated interior and defence ministries accused by Arab Sunni leaders of sanctioning militia death squads, a charge denied by Shi'ite leaders.

REUTERS SRS PM2031