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Cautious optimism after Iraqi political deal
2007-08-27
A new political accord between Iraq's main Sunni Arab, Shi'ite and Kurdish leaders will not be enough to lure boycotting Sunni Arabs back into the government, a spokesman for the biggest Sunni Arab bloc said on Monday. Five leading politicians announced the accord late on Sunday, agreeing on a mechanism for releasing detainees, a law on distributing oil revenue and measures to readmit former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party to public life. Ambassador Ryan Crocker hailed the deal, which will give him at least some good news to deliver in two weeks when he and the top U.S. general in Iraq, David Petraeus, report back to Washington in a pivotal moment for U.S. policy. The measures are among the main benchmarks that Washington has demanded of Iraqi leaders. Crucially, the group included Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, a member of the Accordance Front Sunni Arab bloc which quit the government on August 1. "The statement released by the five leaders yesterday is a positive and encouraging message that the government is making all efforts to achieve benefits for Iraqi people," Crocker told a conference in Arabic on Monday. "I'm optimistic. I can see there is progress," said Crocker. The remarks were a significant change of tone for the diplomat, who said just a week ago that the government's progress was "extremely disappointing." U.S. officials have been suggesting for weeks that Petraeus would give a fairly upbeat assessment of security in Iraq since Washington sent 30,000 extra troops this year but that Crocker would have little progress to report on the political front. SUPPORT QUESTIONED Experts question whether the five leaders who reached the deal have enough support to pass laws in parliament. On the Sunni Arab side, Hashemi leads just one of three parties in the Accordance Front. On the Shi'ite side, the leaders who signed the deal did not include followers of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who also quit the government this year. "I don't see how they can push these through parliament when they don't have a majority in parliament," said Joost Hiltermann of the International Crisis Group think tank. "It will be very difficult to get some of these benchmarks met by this new alliance, which is basically more narrow than the one before." A senior member of the Accordance Front, Hashemi's bloc, said it would not return to the government. "We are not boycotting political dialogue, but this does not mean that we are returning to the government," said Saleem al-Jubouri, a leading Front member of parliament and spokesman. "Yesterday's agreement covered a number of issues ... but we are waiting for action on the ground," he told Reuters. Political leaders in Iraq have announced broad agreements in the past but struggled to implement them or hammer out details. Jubouri said the most progress was made on the issue of rehabilitating Baath Party members, and good steps were also taken on setting up a way to free detainees, tens of thousands of whom are held in U.S. and Iraqi jails without charge. Many of the detainees and Baath Party members are Sunni Arabs who feel persecuted by Maliki's Shi'ite-led government. The Sunnis are also concerned about the oil law because their provinces have far less oil than Shi'ite and Kurdish regions. (Additional reporting by Wisam Mohammed and Peter Graff)
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