BAGHDAD: Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has warned that he will go his own way in January elections if the Shiite bloc that has dominated political life since the 2003 invasion does not do more to open up to Sunni Arabs and Kurds.

In an interview with Egyptian journalists published on his website on Sunday, Maliki called on other Shiite parties in the National Iraqi Alliance to do more to reach out across the sectarian and ethnic divide.

"We have to form a national and non-sectarian alliance, were we respect Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds," the prime minister, who is himself a Shiite, said.

Maliki said that if the Shiite bloc failed to open up, he would be forced to break away and revive the State of Law Coalition, the ticket on which his Dawa party successfully contested provincial elections in January.

"I'm not hiding the fact that a large number of Sunni brothers are putting pressure on me to maintain the State of Law Coalition and to walk together, and we will move on with it if we can't all unite under the tent of the national project," he said.

Tensions have simmered between Maliki and other parties in the Shiite bloc, particularly the powerful Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC), over the inclusion of non-Shiite politicians on a joint list for the election.

In January's elections, Maliki's supporters stood against the SIIC, which had previously dominated provincial government in Shiite central and southern Iraq, and made major gains.

The prime minister has been buoyed by recent shows of support he has received from Sunni Arab groups and tribal leaders, particularly from Al-Anbar province, once a bastion of the Sunni insurgency.

Formerly known as the United Iraqi Alliance, the NIA won 128 seats in the 275-seat parliament in the last parliamentary election in 2005.