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Iraq lawmakers deadlocked over
constitution reforms
22.5.2007
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May 22, 2007
BAGHDAD, Iraq, -- An Iraqi parliamentary
committee has failed to finalise an agreement on
amending key articles in the constitution, one of
the political benchmarks Washington says are
important to end sectarian violence.
After six months of talks, the constitutional reform
committee had been expected to present parliament
with a final draft of their recommendations on
Tuesday.
Committee members said they would ask political
leaders to deal with sensitive issues such as
sharing Iraq's oil wealth more equitably and ending
a ban on former members of Saddam Hussein's party
members holding public office.
"We have agreed on some articles but there are
sensitive issues which need an agreement among the
political leaders," said Saleem al-Jubouri, a member
of the Accordance Front, the biggest Sunni political
bloc in parliament.
The changes are aimed at bringing Sunni Arabs, who
make up the backbone of the insurgency, more firmly
into the political process.
U.S. President George W. Bush, under pressure to
show tangible progress in the four-year-old war, has
pushed Iraqi leaders to agree power-sharing
legislation.
Jubouri said Sunni Arab and Shi'ite members of the
committee disagreed with a Kurdish demand to allow
regions to distribute oil income rather than the
central government.
Some lawmakers from the ruling Shi'ite community,
which was oppressed during Saddam's rule, are
virulently opposed to former Baathists taking up
government jobs.
Non-Arab Kurds, also persecuted under Saddam's
pan-Arab policies, resist wording on the Arab
identity of Iraq.
Sunni Arabs fear federalism will allow Kurds in the
north and Shi'ites in the south, where Iraq's oil
reserves lie, to break away into their own states.
Sunni Arabs live mostly in central and western Iraq,
which is poor in oil.
Jubouri said that one area of disagreement was the
status of the ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk which
sits atop one of the world's richest oilfields.
The current constitution says Iraq should hold a
referendum on the final status of Kirkuk this year.
While Kurds claim Kirkuk as part of Kurdistan, Arabs
oppose this.
Another official in the committee said Arab members
-- Shi'ites and Sunnis -- proposed making Kirkuk a
separate region and dropping the idea of the
referendum, which Kurds would anyway be likely to
win.
"Of course the Kurds don't want this because they
still want it to be part of their autonomous
region," the official said. "Only political leaders
can decide on this. These are very sensitive
issues."
Reuters
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