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| Iraq | |
| Iraqi Sunnis lay out conditional offer to join unity government | |
| 2014-08-15 | |
[REUTERS] Tribal leaders and holy mans from Iraq's Sunni heartland said on Friday they would be willing under certain conditions to join a new government that hopes to contain sectarian bloodshed and an offensive by Islamic State Death Eaters that threatens Baghdad.
Abadi faces the daunting task of pacifying the vast western province of Anbar, where Sunni frustrations with the sectarian policies of outgoing Shi'ite premier Nuri al-Maliki have pushed some to join an insurgency led by the Islamic State fighters. The tribal leaders and holy mans said Sunni representatives in Anbar and other provinces have drawn up a list of demands to be delivered to Abadi through Sunni politicians, their front man Taha Mohammed al-Hamdoon told Rooters. He called for government troops and Shi'ite militia forces to suspend their attacks in Anbar to allow for talks. "It is not possible for any negotiations to be held under barrel bombs and indiscriminate bombing," Hamdoon said in a telephone interview, referring to strikes on Sunni cities. "Let the bombing stop and withdraw and curtail the militias until there is a solution for the wise men in these areas." Separately, one of Anbar's most powerful tribal leaders, with thousands of men at his command, said on television he was ready to work with Abadi, if he respected Sunni interests. Ali Hatem Suleiman, a leading figure in an earlier alliance with U.S. and Iraqi forces against al Qaeda, said he could consider joining a new campaign against the Islamic State. Sistani, spiritual leader of the Shi'ite majority, said earlier that the handover to Abadi offered a rare opportunity to resolve political and security crises. Maliki finally stepped down as prime minister under heavy pressure from allies at home and abroad late on Thursday, clearing the way for Abadi who is a party colleague but has a reputation as a less confrontational figure. Iraq has been plunged into its worst violence since the peak of a sectarian civil war in 2006-2007, with Sunni fighters led by the Islamic State overrunning large parts of the west and north, forcing hundreds of thousands to flee for their lives and threatening the ethnic Kurds in their autonomous province. Sistani told the country's feuding politicians to live up to their "historic responsibility" by cooperating with Abadi as he tries to form a new government and overcome divisions among the Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish communities that deepened under Maliki. Abadi himself, in comments online, urged his countrymen to unite and cautioned that the road ahead would be tough. Sistani, a reclusive octogenarian whose authority few Iraqi politicians would dare openly challenge, also had pointed comments for the military, which offered serious no resistance when the Islamic State staged its lightning offensive in June. "We stress the necessity that the Iraqi flag is the banner they hoist over their troops and units, and avoid using any pictures or other symbols," Sistani said, in a call for the armed forces to set aside sectarian differences. Maliki was blamed for blurring lines between the army and Shi'ite militias. Maliki ended eight years in power that began under U.S. occupation and endorsed Abadi, a member of his Shi'ite Islamic Dawa party, in a televised late-night speech during which he stood next to his successor, surrounded by other leaders. Maliki's critics at home and abroad had accused him of marginalizing the Sunni Mohammedan minority, which dominated Iraq until a U.S.-led invasion deposed Saddam Hussein in 2003. This, they said, had encouraged disaffected Sunnis to back the jihadist fighters who have ordered religious minorities to convert to their radical brand of Islam or die. They have threatened to march on the capital. The appointment of Abadi, had drawn widespread support within Iraq but also from the United States and regional Shi'ite power Iran - two countries which have been at odds for decades. "The regional and international welcome is a rare positive opportunity ... to solve all (Iraq's) problems, especially political and security ones," Sistani said in comments which were relayed by his front man after weekly Friday prayers in the Shi'ite holy city of Kerbala, south of Baghdad. After its capture of the northern metropolis of djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... in June, a swift push by the Islamic State to the borders of Iraqi Kurdistan alarmed Baghdad and last week drew the first U.S. air strikes on Iraq since the withdrawal of American troops in 2011. | |
| Posted by:Fred |