BAGHDAD, Iraq — Embattled Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told the U.S. ambassador that he was Washington's friend but "not America's man in Iraq," ratcheting up his high-stakes and increasingly bitter dispute with the Bush administration, an aide said on Saturday.

The Shiite leader made the declaration in a meeting Friday with Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, after which the men issued a rare joint statement declaring the need to work together to set timelines to clamp off spiraling violence attributed to Shiite militias and death squads.

"I am a friend of the United States, but I am not America's man in Iraq," Hassan al-Sneid, a close al-Maliki aide, quoted him as telling Khalilzad during the meeting.