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Some fear assault will further alienate
Iraq's Sunni minority 15.11.2004
Nawshirwan Mustafa, said Fallujah was a ''hub of
terrorists,''
BY MAGGIE MICHAEL, Associated press |
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Last week, Sheik Mahdi al-Sumaidaei, head of the
Supreme Association for Guidance and Daawa, a
conservative Sunni organization, accused interim
Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's government of
''launching a war on Sunnis.''
The arrests of at least four Sunni clerics in recent
days were being perceived by many within the Sunni
minority as a deliberate policy aimed at targeting
and marginalizing their community, which is in the
majority in the Islamic world.
Premier rejects talk of backlash
For many Sunni Arabs both here and elsewhere in the
Arab world, Fallujah has become the symbol of Iraqi
resistance against the U.S. occupation. But many
Shiites and Kurds do not share that view.
Nawshirwan Mustafa, an official with the Patriotic
Union of Kurdistan, said Fallujah was a ''hub of
terrorists,'' and his only criticism of the U.S.-led
attack was that it did not happen sooner.
Secular politician Modher Shawkat, a top official
with the Shiite National Congress Party, warned that
national unity would be the first victim of ''a wide
perception in the Sunni streets that they are
targeted, and such is a reality even if it is not
intended.''
Allawi, a secular Shiite, brushed aside suggestions
that the offensive would create a backlash among the
Sunni minority.
''There is no problem of Sunnis or Shiites,'' he
said. ''This is all Iraqis against the terrorists.
We are going to keep on breaking their backs
everywhere in Iraq. We are not going to allow them
to win.''
But the Association of Muslim Scholars, considered
the most influential Sunni group in Iraq with 3,000
clerics, has called for a nationwide election
boycott to protest the assault on Fallujah.
Shawkat said that as Allawi struggles to secure the
coming general elections, any results would be
invalid if Sunnis boycott them.
AP
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