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Iraq

Sunnis trade horses with Kurds

2006-01-03

A delegation from the main Sunni coalition, the Arab National Accordance Front, met senior Kurdish officials on Sunday, possibly holding preliminary discussions about the formation of a coalition government ahead of final election results due to be released this week. It was the first trip by a Sunni Arab delegation to Iraq's Kurdish region after the 15 December parliamentary elections, whose results have been contested by the sectarian minority and secular parties. The 10-member delegation was led by two of the front's three leaders: Adnan al-Dulaimi, leader of the General Conference of the Iraqi People, and Tariq al-Hashimi, head of the Iraqi Islamic party. A representative of the secular party led by Iyad Allawi, a Shia and the former prime minister, said the group had not been invited to the Kurdish north, which in recent days has seen a flurry of post-election bargaining between the Kurds and the governing Shia United Iraqi Alliance, which has a strong election lead. Dhafir al-Ani, spokesman for the Accordance Front, told Aljazeera.net the visit had objectives different from those of the visits by al-Jaafari and al-Hakim. "Mr al-Jaafari and Mr al-Hakim may have talked about the formation of the new government in light of the results of last December's elections, but we have a different point of view," he said. "We sought the meeting with Mr Barzani to try to find an exit to solve the differences triggered by the election results," he told Aljazeera.net. Sunni Arab and secular Shia groups have complained that widespread fraud and intimidation tainted the elections and have demanded a rerun of the poll in some provinces including Baghdad, the country's largest with 59 of parliament's 275 seats. They have also welcomed an international electoral monitoring team that is to arrive in Baghdad on Monday to assess the election process, a key opposition demand.

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Iraq

Iraqi Sunni coalition lists priorities

2005-11-17

A Sunni Arab coalition running in next month's general elections has declared that its priority in the new parliament will be to amend the country's new constitution and work on speeding withdrawal of foreign troops. Leaders of the Iraqi Consensus Front said they will work to end ethnic and sectarian quotas for country's Shia, Sunni and Kurdish communities in politics, release all detainees from government prisons and review the laws instituted since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime in April 2003. Although not all Sunni groups plan to take part in the elections, the participation of the front, which includes the Iraqi Islamic Party, the General Conference of the Iraqi People and the National Dialogue Front, is a major change for the sect that ruled Iraq since the domination of Islam on the country in the seventh century. "It is necessary to have a strong state that is capable of running the country's affairs in a good way that will end all the justifications that the occupiers use as an excuse" to stay, the statement said. They added that they will work to make the "occupation forces" put forth a timetable for their withdrawal. The coalition called for the differentiation between the "national resistance" and "terrorism that slipped into the country during the absence of the state". The group appeared to be differentiating between nationalist fighters and al-Qaida in Iraq, which is allegedly led by Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The front also wants to amend articles in the constitution that "infringe on the country's sovereignty and its Arab identity". Sunnis have complained about a clause that says Iraq is a founding member of the Arab League, but does not say that it is part of the Arab Nation (the 22 Arab member states of the Arab League).

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Iraq

Iraq Crackdowns Alienating Sunni Arabs, Leaders Warn

2005-11-14

Could also be titled "Sunni Leaders Squeal Like Piggies" Iraqi Sunni Arab leaders warned yesterday that military and police crackdowns were alienating their minority community in the run-up to December elections for a new parliament. “Large-scale military operations are making the life of local people hell, with disastrous consequences that have led to the deaths of civilians, destruction and arrests,” said a statement from the Islamic Party, a leading Sunni faction. “The party condemns these military operations and calls for their immediate halt in all provinces, especially Al-Anbar and Diyala,” it said, referring to provinces west and northeast of Baghdad. Such operations are “likely to undermine both the political process in these provinces and the security situation” in the run-up to the Dec. 15 elections, it added. “The goal of these operations is to exclude Sunni Arabs from participating” in the elections, charged another Sunni group, the General Conference of the Iraqi People. The government must “halt its military operations” and release political and religious leaders arrested in Diyala, it added. Iraqi security forces on Saturday arrested more than 350 people in Baquba, the capital of ethnically mixed Diyala province, including members of the Islamic Party. US and Iraqi troops have also been involved in major operations in Al-Anbar province, near the Syrian border, sweeping through several towns whose residents fled the offensives.

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