News
from the Arab part of Iraq
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Iraq's Shia's going their own way
7.8.2006
by Mohammed Salih |
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Amid failed moves for a
peace deal between the government and insurgents
through a national reconciliation plan, the Shia
majority in Iraq are pushing ahead for creating a
federal region for themselves in the southern part
of Iraq.
The move is hugely sensitive in the light of the
increasingly hard political positions taken by Shia
Iran and the conflict in Lebanon involving
Hezbollah, the militant Shia group.
"The prime minister's reconciliation project has
failed, and so far no major insurgency group has
endorsed it," Abdullah Aliawayi, Kurdish member of
Iraq's House of Representatives, told IPS. He said
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki had implicitly
acknowledged the failure of his plan at a meeting
with representatives of the major political parties.
The 24-point plan announced by Maliki in June
offered amnesty to insurgents other than those who
had targeted civilians. It also included a plan to
disarm militias. None of these things have happened,
and insurgents still call the shots in Baghdad and
other cities.
According to some official sources, more than 14,000
Iraqis were killed in just the first half of the
year.
Outgoing British ambassador to Iraq William Patey
has warned of civil war in Iraq and a breakup of the
country along sectarian lines. Gen. John Abizaid,
top U.S. commander in the Middle East, has also
warned of civil war if sectarian violence is not
halted.
Many Iraqi politicians go further to say that the
country is in civil war already.
"Iraq is now in a state of undeclared civil war,"
said Aliawayi, who attended a failed meeting of
Iraqi factions in Cairo. "The visions of Sunnis and
Shias for the future of Iraq are too far from each
other to be easily brought together in a joint
program."
As more and more signs of the failure of the
reconciliation plan surface, Shia groups are
speeding up efforts to carve a federal region for
themselves.
Speaking at a ceremony at the holy city Najaf last
week, Iraq's Shia Vice- President Adil Abdul-Mahdi
said Shia parliamentarians will raise the issue of
federalism in parliament.
"We suggest continuing the establishment of
regions," he said. "We are going to submit the
project to the parliament in the coming two months."
The government, he said, had failed to provide basic
services.
Shia politicians claim that the constitution, which
the Sunnis reject, allows them to create their
federal regions. Sunnis see the creation of federal
structures as a prelude to partitioning of the
country.
Many see a link between the deteriorating security
situation in Iraq and the Shia push for autonomy in
the south.
"Certainly the current complicated political and
security situation, in addition to economic factors,
has been a key reason in driving Shias towards
demanding the establishment of their federal regions
in the south," Najdat Akreyi, national security
expert at Erbil's college of political science told
IPS.
If Iraq is to avoid the looming civil war, Akreyi
said it "cannot continue the way it does now." He
said that a federal structure cannot spare the
country from violence, and what Iraq needs is a
system that provides for larger self-rule for the
main ethnic and sectarian groups. This move would be
a step short of federalism.
"Iraq's political map has to be reviewed and redrawn
by creating a system of confederations, which
devolves huge powers to separate Shia, Sunni, and
Kurdish entities to govern themselves," he said.
Since Sunnis control the source of the rivers in
southern Shia Iraq, Shias and Sunnis can exchange
water and oil, he said.
"To prevent further bloodshed, we must not be afraid
to admit that Iraq is not a holy entity, and can be
subject to revisions that can bring stability to the
region," he said. "That is what necessitates
confederation."
The disintegration of former Yugoslavia and the
Soviet Union are good models for Iraq to follow,
Akreyi said.
IPS
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