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Iraqi Shiites denounce draft legislation
26.11.2007
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November 26, 2007
BAGHDAD,-- Shiite legislators on Monday
denounced a draft bill to ease curbs on ex-Saddam
Hussein loyalists in government services, dampening
hopes of progress for the U.S.-backed legislation
aimed at promoting national reconciliation.
The debate over rehabilitating former members of
Saddam Hussein's ruling Baath Party has been a major
obstacle to the ability of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's
government to bring minority Sunnis into the
political process and stem support for the
insurgency.
Parliament began debate on the latest version of the
measure on Sunday. But the session adjourned after
lawmakers loyal to anti-American Shiite cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr began pounding their fists on their
tables in protest.
Many Shiites suffered terribly under the ousted
Sunni-dominated regime.
"The justice system has to have its say in this.
There are Baathists who committed crimes and
atrocities against the Iraqi people and those must
be tried," Bahaa al-Araji, a lawmaker from al-Sadr's
30-member bloc, said Monday at a news conference.
He said the legislators understood many members were
forced to join the Baath Party but said the
legislation did not sufficiently distinguish those
who willingly participated in suppression of
majority Shiites.
The prospect of rehabilitating former Baathists did
not sit well with Shiite lawmakers from other
political parties as well.
"This draft amounts to an unannounced general pardon
by the government," said Safiya al-Suhail, a Shiite
female lawmaker whose father was assassinated by
Saddam's agents in Beirut in the 1990s.
"There is no punishment for wrongdoers," she added.
"The victims of the former regime should see justice
done to them. We will not accept national
reconciliation at the expense of justice."
Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish lawmaker, said parliament
would discuss the draft again on Wednesday.
"I think that the bill is in general a good one,"
Othman said. "The country is in dire need of
national reconciliation ... Iraqis should abandon
revenge and adopt forgiveness."
The United States has been pressing the Iraqis to
relax the ban to allow thousands of lower-ranking
Baathists to regain their posts, but the legislation
has frequently been stalled due to the stark
differences between Shiites seeking revenge and
those who want to put the past behind them.
Enacting and implementing legislation on so-called
de-Baathification is one of 18 so-called benchmark
issues that the U.S. has set as measures for
progress.
Another controversial issue is the need to develop
legislation for the equitable sharing of Iraq's oil
wealth among the varied ethnic and religious groups.
Kurdish authorities insisted on their right to issue
oil drilling and exploration contracts to foreign
firms despite objections by the central government.
The Kurds, who enjoy self-rule in their oil-rich
northern Kurdistan region, have signed eight
contracts and others are expected soon for
operations in the area. But the Oil Ministry said
last week that the contracts were invalid and that
foreign companies that sign them risk being
blacklisted by the Iraqi government.
"I'd like to say frankly that Iraq's Oil Minister
Hussain al-Shahristani cannot nullify any contract
the Kurdistan government has concluded with the
foreign companies," the semiautonomous region's
prime minister, Nechirvan Barzani, told AP
Television News.
"And the Kurdistan government will continue with
concluding contracts within the context of Iraq's
constitution. And if there is any problem of such
kind, we have a constitutional court, and al-Shahristani
can resort to this court," he added.
The Iraqi Cabinet approved a draft bill last
February to regulate the country's oil industry and
forwarded it to parliament. But parliament, citing
legal technicalities, kicked it back to the Cabinet.
The measure has been bogged down in negotiations
ever since.
Last August, the Kurds enacted their own oil law to
regulate the oil sector in the region, further
angering the central government in Baghdad. Most of
Iraq's oil lies in the Shiite-controlled south and
the Kurdish north.
The political paralysis has raised concerns that
failure to achieve reconciliation could stanch
military progress in quelling the violence, which
has continued despite a relative lull.
The Sadrists also are angry over recent raids
against followers, primarily in southern Iraq where
rival militias have been battling, raising fears
that an order by the radical cleric to his Mahdi
Army militia to stand down won't hold.
An al-Sadr follower from Diwaniyah, a mainly Shiite
city 80 miles south of Baghdad, expressed outrage
over a series of recent operations.
"Diwaniyah local authorities are now alleging that
everybody belonging to the Sadrists or the Mahdi
Army or who perform the Friday prayers are outlaws
and should be detained" Ali al-Miali said at the
joint news conference.
In violence Monday, at least two people — a civilian
and a policeman — were killed in separate drive-by
shootings by gunmen on motorcycles in the
predominantly Shiite city of Kut, 100 miles
southeast of Baghdad, police said.
AP
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