Iraq edging towards precipice
Jim Muir
BBC News, Baghdad
The latest sectarian violence in Iraq has made many Iraqis more fearful
than ever before that their country is falling apart and sliding towards
civil strife.
The discovery of the bodies of 18 men, blindfolded and with hands bound,
in the west Baghdad suburb of al-Amriya, is the latest in an apparently
tightening cycle of sectarian reprisals and revenge killings between
Sunnis and Shias.
In the past, many such mass killings have been blamed by Sunni groups on
Shia militia death squads operating under the wing of the Interior
Ministry and its security forces - a charge denied by the authorities.
The Shias have long borne the brunt of the Sunni-based insurgency, with
many thousands killed in an endless series of bomb attacks and other
outrages, many of them directed at public gatherings or holy places.
The country is slipping gradually into a very dangerous and serious
situation
Hussein Shahrastani Senior Shia politician
Shia religious leaders tried to restrain their followers from carrying
out acts of revenge, and were largely successful in the opening phases
of the insurgency.
But over the past year, revenge killings against Sunnis have been
multiplying.
The destruction of the Shia shrine at Samarra on 22 February gave the
country a powerful shove towards the gaping precipice.
Hundreds fleeing
"The country is slipping gradually into a very dangerous and serious
situation," said senior Shia politician Hussein Shahrastani in a BBC
interview.
"After the attack on the shrines in Samarra, it became very clear that
the insurgents and terrorists are determined to drag the country into
civil confrontation and civil war.
"Religious and political leaders have been prudent enough to control the
masses from a violent backlash, but nobody can be sure [what will
happen] if the terrorist attacks continue in this fashion."
Since Samarra, hundreds of people have fled their homes in areas where
they feel uncomfortable or threatened, with Sunnis moving out of
mainly-Shia neighbourhoods and vice versa.
The movement has not become a stampede, but has worried the authorities.
"So far, we have received 350 families, of between three and 12 members
each," said an official of the office run by the militant Shia cleric
Moqtada Sadr in the heavily-Shia stronghold of Sadr City in Baghdad.
"We are trying to settle them in schools and public centres here and in
other Shia areas."
Under protection
The Sadr group has agreed to set up a joint committee with the Sunni
Association of Muslim Scholars to try to deal with the situation.
A spokesman for the association said that at least 60 Sunni families
fled the Nahrawan area east of Baghdad after being threatened in the
wake of sectarian killings there last week.
The way forward, in my view, is an effort to build bridges across
communities
Zalmay Khalilzad US ambassador in Baghdad
Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said on Tuesday that displaced
families would be returned to their homes under the protection of Iraqi
police or army forces.
The Iraqi army said that 13 families who had fled to the Shia district
of al-Sholeh had been taken home under protection. The Association of
Muslim Scholars said that 25 Sunni families had moved out of al-Sholeh
itself.
The US ambassador in Baghdad, Zalmay Khalilzad, interviewed by the Los
Angeles Times, said that "the potential is there" for sectarian violence
to become full-blown civil war in Iraq.
While he believed the country had pulled back from the brink, "if
another incident [occurs], Iraq is really vulnerable to it at this time,
in my judgment."
"We have opened the Pandora's box and the question is, what is the way
forward?" Mr Khalilzad said.
"The way forward, in my view, is an effort to build bridges across
communities."
Political deadlock
He warned of a drastic scenario if Islamic extremists were able to use
part of a fragmented Iraq as a base for regional expansion - it would
make Afghanistan under the Taleban look like "child's play", he said.
His grim assessment contrasted with more upbeat comments from the
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen Peter Pace, who said on
Sunday that things in Iraq were going "very, very well, from everything
you look at".
Ambassador Khalilzad said the formation of an Iraqi national unity
government would provide a major obstacle to those trying to push the
country towards civil war.
But nearly three months on from the 15 December elections, the formation
of any kind of government is still a distant prospect.
There is a deadlock over who should take the most powerful post of prime
minister, with the Shia nomination of the incumbent Ibrahim al-Jaafari
strongly rejected by the Kurdish, Sunni and secular factions, whose
co-operation is necessary to the formation of a coalition government.
Once that problem is solved, haggling over both the political programme
and the personnel in a national unity government is expected to take
weeks, if not months.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/4786660.stm
Published: 2006/03/08 15:48:38 GMT
© BBC MMVI
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