Iraqi interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi signed an amnesty Saturday intended to persuade militants fighting a 15-month-old insurgency to put down their weapons and join government efforts to rebuild the country. But the law pardons only minor criminals, not killers or terrorists, and appeared unlikely to dampen the violence, as some insurgent leaders called it "insignificant." The long-delayed amnesty, coupled with a tough emergency law passed last month, was supposed to help end the violence by coaxing nationalist guerrillas to the government's side. The amnesty applies to minor crimes - such as weapons possession, hiding intelligence about terror attacks or harboring terrorists - and appears intended to persuade people with information on attacks to share it with police. The amnesty forgives those who committed minor crimes between May 1, 2003, just after Saddam Hussein's regime fell, and Saturday, Allawi said. "This amnesty is not for people ... who have killed. Those people will be brought to justice, starting from Zarqawi down to the person in the street," Allawi said, referring to Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose followers have claimed responsibility for deadly suicide bombings. Rape, kidnapping, looting and terror attacks also are excluded. Iraqi officials earlier said the amnesty might extend to those who killed U.S. and other coalition troops. U.S. officials said an early draft was ambiguous on that issue, but later drafts ruled it out.
The amnesty was rejected immediately by militant Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose militia has been fighting coalition forces in the Shiite holy city of Najaf and elsewhere since Thursday. "This is a trivial and insignificant statement," said al-Sadr aide Ahmed al-Shaibany. "Amnesties are for criminals, but resistance is legitimate and does not need an amnesty."
| Okay, he rejected his, now we can thump him. |
Those eligible would need to turn themselves in during the next 30 days and provide information on their crimes and other crimes they know about, Allawi said. The amnesty period could be extended. "This order has been established to allow our citizens to rejoin civil society and participate in the reconstruction of their country and the improvement of their lives, instead of wasting their lives pointlessly toward a lost cause," he said. |