Uncle Sam
02-13-2004, 12:35 PM
http://apnews.myway.com//article/20040213/D80MF2GG0.html
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - A U.N. official said Friday it was unlikely elections could be held before a U.S.-set June 30 deadline for handing power to the Iraqis, and several Iraqi leaders said there was growing support for scrapping the U.S. blueprint for establishing a new government.
U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, meanwhile, warned Iraqis to be aware of the risks of civil war as they try to find an acceptable formula for sovereignty.
"I am a little bit disturbed and a little bit uneasy because there are very serious dangers," Brahimi said. Civil wars erupt, he said, "because people are reckless, people are selfish, because people think more of themselves than they do of their country."
Some members of the U.S.-picked Governing Council were pushing an alternative to the U.S. plan that would call for transferring sovereignty to an expanded council on June 30. The council would then arrange elections before the end of the year.
Doubts about the complex U.S. plan were expressed Friday to Brahimi during a meeting with the 25-member Iraqi Governing Council. Brahimi arrived Sunday to try to break an impasse between the Shiite Muslim clergy and the U.S.-led occupation authority on how to establish a new Iraqi government.
Under the American formula, 18 regional caucuses would pick a new legislature, which in turn would choose a provisional government to take power June 30 and serve until elections in 2005.
The U.S. plan, announced Nov. 15, lost ground when Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani demanded legislative elections before June 30. Al-Sistani called the caucuses method "illegitimate."
Many top Iraqis also opposed the caucus system because it gave the United States too much influence over the process, an official close to the discussions with the U.N. said.
Opposition to the U.S. plan among the Governing Council is significant because it was a signatory of the Nov. 15 agreement, along with the U.S.-led occupation authority.
Brahimi told reporters Friday that he would return to New York and submit his recommendations to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in a week to 10 days. Asked if the caucus plan was dead, Brahimi said that decision was not his to make but "I think the people who put it together realize that, at the very least, it needs to be improved considerably."
A spokesman for Brahimi said Friday that Sistani's demand for nationwide balloting would probably be too difficult to pull off by July in strife-ridden Iraq.
"The time between now and June is very short and that makes it unlikely that you can put mechanisms in place," U.N. spokesman Ahmad Fawzi told The Associated Press. "The elections don't have to happen before then."
Brahimi met Thursday with al-Sistani at the ayatollah's home in the Shiite holy city of Najaf. In Beirut, al-Sistani's spokesman, Hamed al-Khafaf, said Friday the two had reached an "understanding" on "the necessity of holding general elections."
"Several ideas were submitted and they are being studied and they carry lots of positive aspects," al-Khafaf said.
Persistent violence by anti-U.S. insurgents is one of the reasons U.S. officials say elections can't be held before July. Supporters of Saddam Hussein's ousted regime and foreign Islamic militants are believed to be stepping up their attacks in an attempt to derail the creation of a new Iraqi government.
In Baghdad, an explosive detonated as a U.S. military police patrol passed, killing one soldier and wounding two others, a U.S. military spokesman said.
Back-to-back suicide bombings Tuesday and Wednesday killed 100 Iraqis, many of them would-be volunteers looking to join the new police or military forces.
Also Thursday, gunmen staged a bold attack on an Iraqi security compound in the turbulent town of Fallujah just as the head of U.S. forces in the Middle East, Gen. John Abizaid was visiting.
Abizaid was unharmed when the gunmen opened fire on his convoy with rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons. But the attack raised questions about whether insurgents had been tipped of on his visit. Two Iraqis were killed by U.S. fire in the gunbattle, according to witnesses. No American soldiers were hurt.
The general told The Associated Press on Friday that he believes it was a random assault, and he discounted suggestions that the insurgents may have been tipped off.
"I think it was random, sure," Abizaid said, speaking in his office at Central Command's Persian Gulf headquarters in Qatar, where he returned Thursday night after two days of visiting troops in Iraq.
South Korea's parliament, meanwhile, approved a plan to send 3,000 troops to Iraq, which would make Korea the third-largest contributor to coalition forces after the United States and Britain. South Korea hopes to send the new forces to the northern Iraqi town of Kirkuk before the end of April.
Following Friday's meeting with Brahimi, several council members from different factions, as well as others familiar with the discussions, said opposition among Iraqi leaders was likely to quash the caucus formula. Many of them understood the difficulty of holding an election by June 30.
Support for handing power to an expanded Governing Council instead of a caucus-selected legislature appeared strongest among the 13 Shiite council members.
Shiites, believed to make up 60 percent of Iraq's 25 million people, expect to dominate an elected government. Sunni Muslim leaders say they are unprepared for an early election and fear rule by Shiites, who have been long suppressed by Sunni-dominated governments.
Younadem Kana, an Assyrian Christian member of the council, said the caucus plan was "not 100 percent dead yet" but that alternatives were under discussion.
If caucuses are cast aside, Kana said one alternative would be to add to the council representatives of several Iraqi political parties that were not invited or chose not to join when the United States picked the members in July. He said those parties represent Arab nationalists, monarchists, Sunni Muslim groups and others.
The proposal has not been finalized and was not discussed in detail with Brahimi during Friday's meeting, said Samir Shaker Mahmoud, a prominent Sunni Muslim author and council member.
"The questions that remain are when and how elections will be held," Mahmoud said.
Mouwafak al-Rubaie, a Shiite member, said he believed al-Sistani, the ayatollah, would go along with the expanded council formula. Al-Sistani does not grant media interviews and issued no statement after his talks with Brahimi.
The Bush administration is eager to end the formal occupation of Iraq and hand over security to Iraqis well before the November U.S. presidential elections. But its plans have been twice disrupted by al-Sistani, who commands enormous prestige among the majority Shiite population.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - A U.N. official said Friday it was unlikely elections could be held before a U.S.-set June 30 deadline for handing power to the Iraqis, and several Iraqi leaders said there was growing support for scrapping the U.S. blueprint for establishing a new government.
U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, meanwhile, warned Iraqis to be aware of the risks of civil war as they try to find an acceptable formula for sovereignty.
"I am a little bit disturbed and a little bit uneasy because there are very serious dangers," Brahimi said. Civil wars erupt, he said, "because people are reckless, people are selfish, because people think more of themselves than they do of their country."
Some members of the U.S.-picked Governing Council were pushing an alternative to the U.S. plan that would call for transferring sovereignty to an expanded council on June 30. The council would then arrange elections before the end of the year.
Doubts about the complex U.S. plan were expressed Friday to Brahimi during a meeting with the 25-member Iraqi Governing Council. Brahimi arrived Sunday to try to break an impasse between the Shiite Muslim clergy and the U.S.-led occupation authority on how to establish a new Iraqi government.
Under the American formula, 18 regional caucuses would pick a new legislature, which in turn would choose a provisional government to take power June 30 and serve until elections in 2005.
The U.S. plan, announced Nov. 15, lost ground when Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani demanded legislative elections before June 30. Al-Sistani called the caucuses method "illegitimate."
Many top Iraqis also opposed the caucus system because it gave the United States too much influence over the process, an official close to the discussions with the U.N. said.
Opposition to the U.S. plan among the Governing Council is significant because it was a signatory of the Nov. 15 agreement, along with the U.S.-led occupation authority.
Brahimi told reporters Friday that he would return to New York and submit his recommendations to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan in a week to 10 days. Asked if the caucus plan was dead, Brahimi said that decision was not his to make but "I think the people who put it together realize that, at the very least, it needs to be improved considerably."
A spokesman for Brahimi said Friday that Sistani's demand for nationwide balloting would probably be too difficult to pull off by July in strife-ridden Iraq.
"The time between now and June is very short and that makes it unlikely that you can put mechanisms in place," U.N. spokesman Ahmad Fawzi told The Associated Press. "The elections don't have to happen before then."
Brahimi met Thursday with al-Sistani at the ayatollah's home in the Shiite holy city of Najaf. In Beirut, al-Sistani's spokesman, Hamed al-Khafaf, said Friday the two had reached an "understanding" on "the necessity of holding general elections."
"Several ideas were submitted and they are being studied and they carry lots of positive aspects," al-Khafaf said.
Persistent violence by anti-U.S. insurgents is one of the reasons U.S. officials say elections can't be held before July. Supporters of Saddam Hussein's ousted regime and foreign Islamic militants are believed to be stepping up their attacks in an attempt to derail the creation of a new Iraqi government.
In Baghdad, an explosive detonated as a U.S. military police patrol passed, killing one soldier and wounding two others, a U.S. military spokesman said.
Back-to-back suicide bombings Tuesday and Wednesday killed 100 Iraqis, many of them would-be volunteers looking to join the new police or military forces.
Also Thursday, gunmen staged a bold attack on an Iraqi security compound in the turbulent town of Fallujah just as the head of U.S. forces in the Middle East, Gen. John Abizaid was visiting.
Abizaid was unharmed when the gunmen opened fire on his convoy with rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons. But the attack raised questions about whether insurgents had been tipped of on his visit. Two Iraqis were killed by U.S. fire in the gunbattle, according to witnesses. No American soldiers were hurt.
The general told The Associated Press on Friday that he believes it was a random assault, and he discounted suggestions that the insurgents may have been tipped off.
"I think it was random, sure," Abizaid said, speaking in his office at Central Command's Persian Gulf headquarters in Qatar, where he returned Thursday night after two days of visiting troops in Iraq.
South Korea's parliament, meanwhile, approved a plan to send 3,000 troops to Iraq, which would make Korea the third-largest contributor to coalition forces after the United States and Britain. South Korea hopes to send the new forces to the northern Iraqi town of Kirkuk before the end of April.
Following Friday's meeting with Brahimi, several council members from different factions, as well as others familiar with the discussions, said opposition among Iraqi leaders was likely to quash the caucus formula. Many of them understood the difficulty of holding an election by June 30.
Support for handing power to an expanded Governing Council instead of a caucus-selected legislature appeared strongest among the 13 Shiite council members.
Shiites, believed to make up 60 percent of Iraq's 25 million people, expect to dominate an elected government. Sunni Muslim leaders say they are unprepared for an early election and fear rule by Shiites, who have been long suppressed by Sunni-dominated governments.
Younadem Kana, an Assyrian Christian member of the council, said the caucus plan was "not 100 percent dead yet" but that alternatives were under discussion.
If caucuses are cast aside, Kana said one alternative would be to add to the council representatives of several Iraqi political parties that were not invited or chose not to join when the United States picked the members in July. He said those parties represent Arab nationalists, monarchists, Sunni Muslim groups and others.
The proposal has not been finalized and was not discussed in detail with Brahimi during Friday's meeting, said Samir Shaker Mahmoud, a prominent Sunni Muslim author and council member.
"The questions that remain are when and how elections will be held," Mahmoud said.
Mouwafak al-Rubaie, a Shiite member, said he believed al-Sistani, the ayatollah, would go along with the expanded council formula. Al-Sistani does not grant media interviews and issued no statement after his talks with Brahimi.
The Bush administration is eager to end the formal occupation of Iraq and hand over security to Iraqis well before the November U.S. presidential elections. But its plans have been twice disrupted by al-Sistani, who commands enormous prestige among the majority Shiite population.