By HAMZA HENDAWI, Associated Press Writer
Oct 13, 2007
BAGHDAD - The son and heir apparent of Iraq's top Shiite politician came out
strongly Saturday in favor of autonomy for Iraq's religiously and ethnically
divided regions, a potentially explosive issue on Iraq's already highly
polarized political landscape.
Ammar al-Hakim, who is being groomed to take over the Supreme Islamic Iraqi
Council, the country's largest Shiite party, has been a firm supporter of
federalism from the outset. But his unusually strident language appeared to
signal growing impatience with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's inaction on key
issues and his failure to bring fractured groups together.
Addressing hundreds of supporters at the party's Baghdad headquarters, al-Hakim
called on Iraqis to press ahead with the creation of self-rule regions, but
cautioned that the country's unity must be safeguarded.
"Federalism is one way to accomplish this goal," he said.
He said Baghdad's monopoly of power over decision-making and national wealth had
turned the central government into a "tyrannical and dominating" body.
"I call on the sons of our nation to create their (self-rule) regions," al-Hakim
said.
The idea of breaking up Iraq into self-rule entities has gained traction in
Washington after two lawmakers — Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., and Sen. Sam
Brownback, R-Kan. — proposed giving more control to ethnically and religiously
divided regions.
A nonbinding resolution to that effect won Senate approval last month, but
Republicans supported it only after the measure was amended to make clear that
President Bush should press for a new federalized system only if the Iraqis
wanted it.
Al-Maliki and other Iraqi politicians denounced the decision as an infringement
on Iraq's sovereignty. But President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd and firm proponent
of federalism, praised the resolution, saying it cemented Iraq's unity and
opposed its breakup.
Al-Hakim is the son of Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, the Supreme Council leader who was
diagnosed with cancer in May and has been receiving chemotherapy treatment in
Iran.
The younger al-Hakim delivered the remarks in a sermon commemorating the start
of the Muslim Eid al-Fitr feast that marks the end of Ramadan, the Islamic month
of fasting. His father, the organization's patriarch, greeted well-wishers at
the ceremony but did not address the crowd.
The Supreme Council has been a staunch backer of federalism and wants the
country's mainly Shiite and oil-rich south become a self-rule region similar to
that established 16 years ago by minority Kurds in northern Iraq.
The Iraqi constitution, adopted two years ago, provides for a federal system. A
year ago, parliament pushed through a law allowing the formation of federal
regions but not for 18 months.
Regardless, federal regions cannot be formed before nationwide elections are
first held for local councils. Those councils will decide on seeking union with
other provinces to form a federal region. No date has been set for the vote
because parliament has yet to pass legislation on the organization of local
elections.
The law is one of several Washington has been pressing al-Maliki's government to
push through parliament to enhance reconciliation. Others would ensure equitable
distribution of oil wealth and reinstatement of Saddam Hussein loyalists in
government jobs.
Al-Maliki has failed to achieve progress on the wanted legislation despite a
major eight-month-old security drive in Baghdad and surrounding regions that was
launched in part to give him the room he needs to make political compromises.
The joint U.S.-Iraqi operation has reduced the level of violence but failed to
stem it altogether. On Saturday, a spokesman said Iraqi forces clashed with
suspected al-Qaida-linked insurgents during a four-day operation in a Sunni
enclave in central Baghdad.
Brig. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, an Iraqi military spokesman, said 48 gunmen were
killed in the fighting, in which Iraqi army soldiers were supported by local
Sunni tribesmen and other civilians who have turned against al-Qaida in the
volatile Fadhil neighborhood.
The U.S. military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Saturday, however, saw Iraq's civilian death toll fall to its lowest level in
recent memory, with only four people killed or found dead nationwide, according
to reports from police, morgue officials and credible witnesses.
The daily number of civilians killed, not including those on days when there
were massive casualties from car bombings, had climbed above 100 at the end of
2006 and the beginning of 2007.
Still, security is the main concern in Iraq, more than four years after the U.S.
invasion, but the question of federalism is potentially explosive and could
deepen the sectarian divide.
Iraq's once-dominant Sunni Arabs, for example, fear that it would lead to the
country's breakup into a Shiite south and a Kurdish north, both with
considerable oil wealth, leaving Sunnis the resource-poor central region. They
see the creation of an autonomous region in the south as a scheme engineered by
Shiite, non-Arab Iran to gain a permanent foothold in Iraq.
But not all of Iraq's majority Shiites back autonomy.
The Sadrists, a parliamentary bloc loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, are
flatly opposed to it, while others, like al-Maliki's Dawa Party, warn that
federalism could deepen Iraq's security and sectarian woes if implemented soon.
