BAGHDAD (AP) -– The Iraqi journalist who hurled his shoes at President George W. Bush is begging for a pardon for what he described as ""an ugly act,"" the prime minister's spokesman said Thursday.

Muntadhar al-Zeidi, a correspondent for an Iraqi-owned television station based in Cairo, Egypt, could face two years imprisonment for insulting a foreign leader. He remained in custody Thursday night.
""It is too late to reverse the big and ugly act that I perpetrated,"" al-Zeidi wrote in a letter delivered to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, according to the prime minister's spokesman.
The spokesman, Yassin Majid, told The Associated Press that al-Zeidi went on in the letter to recall an interview he conducted with the prime minister in 2005 when al-Maliki invited him into his home, saying: ""Come in, it is your home too.""
""So I ask for your pardon, Excellency,"" Majid quoted the letter as saying.
However, the journalist's brother, Dhargham al-Zeidi, told the AP he was skeptical that his brother would write such a letter.
""I am suspicious that my brother wrote that letter to al-Maliki because I know my brother very well,"" he said. He added that family members and staffers from Al-Baghdadia would stage a sit-in Friday near the U.S.-controlled Green Zone.
White House press secretary Dana Perino said Thursday that she'd seen reports that al-Zeidi had apologized but that she did not know whether Bush was aware of them.
""The president harbors no hard feelings about it, and the Iraqis have a process that they'll follow,"" Perino said. ""But he did urge them not to overreact, because he was not bothered by the incident, although it's not appropriate for people to throw shoes at a press conference, at any leader.""
Perino suffered a bruised eye in the melee that followed the attack.
""What happened to me was just an accident in the melee. It's not — I'm not bothered by it. It's not all that pretty,"" she said referring to her bruise, ""but I'm not worried about it.""
Al-Zeidi has been in custody since the Sunday night incident, which occurred during a news conference by Bush and al-Maliki.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said he will be tried for ""insult to a foreign leader, attempted assault.""
""This behavior was despicable, was affront to the Iraqi culture, Iraqi people, of hospitality, of self-respect, and it was an alien, alien move — and the government has condemned it, and many Iraqis have condemned it,"" Zebari said in an interview with The Associated Press at U.N. headquarters in New York Thursday. ""But it has created a phenomena in the Arab world. They're boasting about it as if a great victory has been achieved.""
Zebari said it was unlikely al-Zeidi would be released without being sentenced.
""Really, if this incident had happened during Saddam's rule, he would have been shot on the spot,"" he said.
The case has riveted Iraq, with many Iraqis considering him a hero for defying a president they blame for destroying the country.