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A two-state solution for Iraq? Sunnis and
Kurds in one State !
28.11.2006 |
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WASHINGTON,
November 28, -- While Washington buzzes with
theories for a potential way out of Iraq, a risk
management expert poses a new option: split Iraq in
two.
"We need radical thinking. The military situation
(in Iraq) cries out for political experimentation,"
David Apgar, author of Risk Intelligence, told
United Press International.
Apgar advocates dividing Iraq into two separate
states, with the border running from northeast to
southwest, dividing the two countries just south of
Baghdad.
"This partition proposal is not based purely on
ethnicity. The two states would share Iraq's Shiite
population between them, while one of the states
would also include just about all of Iraq's Sunnis
and Kurds," Apgar explained.
The northern state would be composed of nearly equal
proportions of Sunnis and Kurds, with a minority
Shiite population living in and around Baghdad.
The southern Shiite state would include the major
Shiite holy sites as well as the southern oil
fields. Apgar's proposal relies on the theorizing of
Ian Bremmer, a political scientist and president of
Eurasia Group, in his recent book called "The J
Curve." Bremmer's model, based on a composite of
political openness, political stability, and
availability of economic capital, suggests that
closed states stabilize by growing more closed and
open states stabilize by becoming more open.
Applying Bremmer's theory to Iraq, Apgar explained
that a northern state comprising the Sunnis, Iraq's
administrative class, the Kurds, a cosmopolitan
diaspora, and the urban Shiites would favor more
open governance.
A southern Shiite state would likely favor
traditional governance, perhaps under Islamic law,
Apgar said. With a political solution, the military
could then oversee the transition.
"We seem to stick with one political conception in
Iraq for years, or certainly months, at a time. We
need the same kind of trial and error in our
political approach that we use in our military
approach," Apgar said.
It might offer a new option and along with it a
recipe for more disaster.
UPI
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