Oilman Hunt Sees A ‘Soft Partition’ For Iraq

Posted on June 5th, 2008 11:32am

By Glenn Hunter

Billionaire oilman Ray Hunt has never talked much about an oil-exploration agreement his Hunt Oil Co. signed last year with the government of Iraq’s Kurdistan Region. Hunt, a close friend of President George W. Bush, is said to have ticked off officials in Washington and Baghdad when the company secretly negotiated the contract, which calls for exploration in the Dahuk region of the Kurdish-controlled north. But last night, as Hunt (pictured here) was being honored in Dallas by the Entrepreneurs Foundation of North Texas, he opened up about the agreement during a Q&A session before an admiring crowd. When someone asked him why he “gets up in the morning,” Hunt replied the reason is: “Being a catalyst.” A little later, he expounded on the controversial contract, the war on terror, and his vision for Iraq’s future.

The Kurdistan oil play is “going very well,” Hunt said. “The conventional wisdom has been that Iraq is a horrible place that doesn’t have its act together, and of course nobody likes to see death and destruction. But if anybody wanted to be a billionaire, I know how they could have done it. Turn back the clock to Sept. 12, the day after 9/11, and if you’d driven to Las Vegas–you couldn’t fly then–and taken six $100 bills into six of the gambling houses, and said, ‘What odds will you give me that there won’t be a terrorist event in the United States in the next seven years?’– today you’d be a billionaire. And, people have lost sight of that.

“But if you go to Iraq today, the violence is occurring in the southern portions, not in Kurdistan. It’s a different society. It’s been a very stable area. We looked at it, and considered that the conventional wisdom may be wrong. The Kurds are surrounded by enemies; they were the reason we had the no-fly zone in the north, because Saddam Hussein had massacred the Kurds. So we took the position, we saw that the native Kurds who had fled to Europe and the U.S. were moving back. The year before we went in, the price of real estate there increased 10-fold.

“I went to sign the contract myself. When I got to Kurdistan, there was no litter anywhere. They also have their version of the Texas Rangers there, who are able to keep the terrorists out of the area; they’re also helping push al-Qaida out of Mosul. So, we went in and negotiated the contracts we have. There were a number of legal things that were done just right. We’ve completed all the pre-work, and we’re ready to drill a well right now. Now other people are saying, ‘Maybe we should take a second look at this.’ So, our company in some small way might be causing other companies to take a second look at a part of Iraq.

“I think that, in the end, you’ll end up with a soft partition of Iraq, a very decentralized government, with authority granted to three provinces. The Kurds I think will end up being an example, especially with the Internet–you can’t hold back the flow of information–and people will say, “This is happening in Kurdistan; we want it to happen in Iraq [as a whole].” American democracy is not one-size-fits-all, but, as an example of what freedom can do, it’s remarkable that this can happen.

“And, I guess all that goes back to why I get up in the morning.”

Source: Frontburner

Iraq Partitioning, Inevitable?

By J. W. KRAFT

June 8, 2008

Iraq never should have been a country.  Its borders are lines drawn in the sand by colonial powers after World War I.  The various peoples have no historic ties to bind them together in neighborly love nor do they have political, religious, or ideological ties.  Saddam Hussein was able to keep the country nominally unified through extreme brutality.

It should be partitioned into at least three smaller countries.  This would allow the Sunni, Shia, and Kurds to govern themselves as they see fit.  The only reason that the country was not partitioned after the ouster of Hussein was that the United States did not want to be accused of nation making by Britain, France, Russia, China, and others.  Make no mistake, the world powers will for the most part jump at any opportunity to criticize the U.S. but that is still the course of action that should have been taken and is possibly what should still happen.

The difficulty now is that the United States claims to have given sovereignty to Baghdad.  Of course any sovereignty Baghdad has is at the pleasure of the US as the US gave it to them and props them up through blood and treasure but, it is necessary to maintain the illusion of Iraqi sovereignty for diplomatic reasons.

A lot has been made of the division of oil wealth and how that is an obstacle to partition.  Call me old fashioned, but Iraq does not share its oil revenue with its neighbors currently, does it?  Does Japan share the revenue it gets from exporting electronics with Korea?  No, of course not.  Why would it?  I see no reason why Sunni Iraq should be expected to share revenue with Shia Iraq or vice versa.  To me this is a non-issue and those that are making a big deal of it are naïve, communal hippies, or attempting to stop progress.

Certainly partitioning Iraq would be of benefit to the average Iraqi but they can hardly be expected to take kindly to a foreign power chopping up their country.  If the US and Britain (etc.) were to completely pull out of Iraq before completely beating all remnant of the various militant groups, then it is very likely that Iraq would divide along sectarian lines anyway.  It may be inevitable; Iraq does not want to be a country.  In the absence of a strong armed dictator or foreign military powers, Iraq may just dissolve.

Source: J. W. KRAFT Blog

Iraq deserves more credit for its nascent democracy

Iraq deserves more credit for its nascent democracy

By AUSTIN BAY

June 7, 2008

Considering the violent threats, fractured politics and bitter history it confronts, Iraq’s democratic government has accomplished much in two short years.

For a variety of reasons — most self-serving, a few disgustingly dishonest — American and European debate over Iraq all too often loses or conveniently discards three pertinent facts regarding the Iraq of May 2008: It has survived in very complex conditions; it is the product of democratic elections; and it has several hard-fought but significant accomplishments in its two bloody years of existence.

Its birth was hard and isn’t over. The Iraqi general elections of December 2005 — which laid the foundations for the new government — reflected not only the deep and fractured politics of post-despotism Iraq but provided a representative sample of the entire Middle East’s fractious ethnic and sectarian divisions.

For at least seven millennia, Mesopotamia has been precious terrain, and that long history involves multiple births, collisions and deaths. The present sectarian and ethnic mosaic is a product of that rich history. Mesopotamia has seen several determinative births, including the Agricultural Revolution and, if you credit Abraham of Ur, the birth of Western monotheism. Empires have expanded and shrunken to ruins, with Babylon (its bricks lie south of Baghdad) as a premier example.

Many Mesopotamian collisions remain unresolved — not just between Shia and Sunni Muslims (a product in part of the battle of Karbala in A.D. 680), but between Semitic Arabs and Iranians. And don’t forget Arabs encountering Turks, with Kurds in the buffer.

Vicious tyranny put a murderous, exploitative clamp on these people — in Saddam Hussein’s case an adventurous tyranny willing to invade Iran and Kuwait and wage 12 years of sanctions war with the United Nations. Various terrorist groups promise various utopias (in al-Qaida’s case, a global “sectarian cleansing”).

The December 2005 elections continued the difficult process of mitigating these collisions and divisions, a process arguably begun when the United Nations established post-Desert Storm no-fly zones over northern and southern Iraq. Post-election attempts to form a government repeatedly failed. A mid-March 2006 goal for establishing a government came and went. The February 2006 terror attack that destroyed Samarra’s Golden Mosque was timed to thwart any parliamentary compromise.

Yet Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki never buckled. In late May 2006, the fractious parliament approved a cabinet — another step in the birth process of democratic government in Mesopotamia.

Maliki faced repeated attempts to oust him — attempts using terror and violence but also using parliamentary means, which are, paradoxically, a positive sign.

The Iraqi government hasn’t met American expectations, which are largely shaped by the American presidential election cycle, but dismissing its achievements is arrogant and ignorant. It is also myopic, given the century-shaping regional and global implications of Iraqi success.

The Federalism Law, de-Baathification reforms and amnesty laws and the Provincial Powers Act are major acts of legislation, especially when crafted, debated and passed in the midst of sensational terrorist attacks designed to shake the confidence of Iraqis and keep international media focused on conflict instead of maturing compromise.

Reconciliation and consolidation have not been achieved, though Iraqis clearly know a lot more about reconciliation in Iraq than Americans. The December 2006 execution of Saddam, marred though it was, removed the personality from the tyrant’s cult of the personality. Saddam’s “former regime elements” believed that if they hung on Saddam would return to power. The dictator’s open and fair trial also served as a forum to express the people’s shared suffering.

Operation Charge of the Knights, begun in southern Iraq in March, followed by Lion’s Roar in the Mosul area, are security operations that have clearly served the larger political purposes of strengthening national support for the federal government. Kurds and Sunni Arabs expressed overwhelming support for Charge of the Knights attacks on Shia gangs. The Mosul offensive was designed to destroy al-Qaida cells that have increasingly focused their violence on Iraqi Sunnis who have joined the political process.

Success over the last two years has been incremental — democracies tend to work that way. There are signs, however that a democratic foundation is being built for a more secure, productive and free Iraqi future.

Bay, a nationally syndicated columnist based in Texas, specializes in military and foreign affairs.

Source: www.chron.com

Article 140 and the Future of Iraq

Article 140 and the Future of Iraq

By Nadine Hoffman

Sunday, 18 May 2008, 02:32 EDT

A Capitol Hill conference co-sponsored by the Washington Kurdish Institute (WKI) and the University of Pennsylvania explored the challenges of implementing 140 and its implications for Iraq’s future.

Washington Kurdish Institute (WKI) President Dr. Najmaldin Karim described Article 140 as the most pressing issue in Iraq, describing the gerrymandering, expulsion of citizens, and ethnic cleansing that led to the disputed territory, including Kirkuk. This provision in Iraq’s constitution calls for normalization with compensation to move settlers back to their original areas and to return rightful inhabitants to their homes. A census and referendum would follow this process. In reexamining the boundaries of Kurdistan and other governates, areas with a clear Kurdish majority have the right to join the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Dr. Karim said. Kirkuk remains in limbo until its status is decided, unable to get resources from either the KRG or the federal government.

General Jay Garner, who spoke after Dr. Karim, described the Kurds as the most vibrant people he has ever met. The constellations are all aligned, General Garner said, and Iraqi Kurdistan is the best environment in the Middle East. “If I lived in Kirkuk,” General Garner said, “I know how I’d vote.”

The first panel discussion, Article 140 and the Iraq Constitution, included Ambassador Peter Galbraith, Joe Reeder, Jason Gluck, and Professor Brendan O’Leary, and was chaired by Dr. Karim. Ambassador Galbraith, fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, said that Kurdistan is in every regard an independent country except in terms of international recognition, and its de facto independence is enshrined in Iraq’s constitution. The only place where democracy exists in Iraq is in Kurdistan, which he described as imperfect but pluralistic. He stressed that referendums do not lend themselves to compromise, and that there will be a winner and a loser. This should be accepted while seeking a way to mitigate the pain of those who lose through meaningful power sharing. Reeder, former Under Secretary of the U.S. Army, described a different approach to Kirkuk consisting of “nothing but compromise.” The challenges of implementing Article 140 are formidable and factors to take into account include justice, self determination, fairness and stability. Sanctity of rule of law is essential if the agreement is to be honored, and minorities must perceive that they will be treated fairly, which depends on good governance. The extended June 30, 2008 deadline will not be met, Reeder said, because of two main challenges - the inherent difficulty of political line drawing and the ambiguity of Article 140. He compared the situation to tensions in Kosovo, and said drawing lines comes down to villages. Reeder said his most important advice to all parties was to be nice. “The Kurds deserve the world’s sympathy as much as Israel,” Reeder said.

Gluck, a rule of law advisor for the U.S. Institute of Peace, offered an opposing viewpoint. With the original deadline past, he said, it is no longer mandatory to hold a referendum; under the letter of the law the Iraqi government’s responsibility is past. Gluck said there could be no purely legal solution and a resolution would require a political agreement. He said a hostile all or nothing referendum will increase tensions and allegations of voter intimidation are likely. Iraqi Kurdistan will find itself standing alone against Turkey, Syria, and Iran and maybe lose some areas that they currently administer, he said. Professor Brendan O’Leary, the Director of University of Pennsylvania’s Penn Program in Ethnic Conflict, responded strongly against Gluck’s remarks. He said it would be a great error to declare Article 140 null and void.

O’Leary dismissed four clichés about Kirkuk, starting with what is at stake. Saying oil is at stake in Kirkuk ignores key constitutional provisions under which oil is allocated to Iraq as a whole, regardless of where it comes from. The situation is “not an oil grab conspiracy,” he said. The second myth is that Kirkuk is sitting on a powder keg. Unification through due process would not precipitate such violence as long as sufficient security was maintained, he said. Professor O’Leary called the third cliché the “terrible Turk thesis” - the idea that Turkey will do everything in its power to prevent the unification of Kirkuk with the KRG. He said he doesn’t think the Turks will do this because of their desire to join the European. Finally, he tackled the “crazy Kurd conjecture,” or the idea that the Kurds are planning their independence. In fact, Iraqi Kurds don’t need to declare their independence because Kurdistan is freer now than any EU member state.

Dr. Kamal Kirkuki, Deputy Speaker of Parliament in the KRG, followed the first panel. He called a centralized Iraq dangerous and said the Kurds don’t want revenge, just a chance to address injustices. “We want to remember,” he said, “like the Holocaust.” He discussed the progression of Iraq’s government grabbing land from Kurdistan over time. Saddam added Arab areas to Kirkuk to change the demographics,www.ekurd.net and concluded, “In a peaceful, lawful way, we want people to go back to their areas.” Dr. Mohammad Ihsan, KRG’s Minister for Extra-Regional Affairs, further explored the issue of demographics. In 1968 a policy of “normalization” led to forced immigration in and out of areas and new settlers were lured with agricultural contracts. Regarding the question of currently disputed areas, Dr. Ihsan said those who do not know what territory this includes do not know about Iraq or think its history started in 2003

President of the Kurdish Institute of Paris Dr. Kendal Nezan addressed concerns of neighboring countries regarding Article 140. Iran and Syria are not very happy with Iraqi Kurdistan because of their own marginalized Kurdish populations, but the U.S. doesn’t care about these countries’ concerns. The U.S. does, however, care about Turkey, where the Kurdish issue remains unsolved. Turkey, meanwhile, is concerned with the rights of the Iraqi Turcoman population of about 400,000-500,000. Ottoman sources refer to Kirkuk as Turkish, while the League of Nations in 1925 confirmed the Kurdishness of the region. The Kurdish prejudice started in 1925, Dr. Kendal said, and has to be solved. An agreement between the Turks, the Kurds, and the West should be sought, he said.

Dr. Saman Shali, President of the Kurdish National Congress spoke next, saying Iraq’s constitution was endorsed by the U.N., the U.S. and Iraq, including Article 140, which gives people in the disputed areas the right to “choose their destiny.” Not implementing Article 140 takes away stability and peace and a new set of conditions introduced to the Article undermines the constitution. Not upholding Article 140 is a “slap in the face of democracy, freedom, and human rights,” he said.

The second panel discussion, Reconciliation and Power-Sharing, included David Phillips, Ambassador David Berger, Erin Matthews, David Pollack, and Qubad Talabany. Professor O’Leary chaired the discussion. Phillips, a visiting scholar at Columbia University’s Center for the Study of Human Rights, called reconciliation a process, not an event, and said power sharing is essential so that people feel they have recourse without resorting to violence. He explored the technical issues associated with minority rights and said it was important to “give minorities a piece of the pie.”

National Democratic Institute (NDI) director of Iraq programs Erin Matthews spoke about NDI’s project-based efforts at problem solving at the community level in Kirkuk and stumbling blocks encountered. In bringing civil society groups together without political parties, Matthews found that citizens felt impotent when it came to Article 140. The problems this has caused are immediate, with sectarianism a larger issue in Kirkuk that in other parts of Iraq.

Ambassador Berger, a former Canadian ambassador and MP, argued that federalism ensures freedom because it is competitive. He cited three potential solutions for a diverse state: one group rules, the country breaks up, or there is a “messy democracy” i.e. a federal Iraq. He called Kurdistan’s experience “the beginning of a new direction in the Middle East.”

Pollack, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said Article 140 is only one aspect of the broad issue of reconciliation - the larger issue in his view is power sharing between Kurds and Arabs and reconciliation between Iraq and its neighbors. It is important that Kurdistan does not suffer the fate of Pakistan with respect to its involvement in Kashmir, he said, and that it doesn’t mortgage its future on Kirkuk.

Talabany, the KRG’s representative to the U.S., said the KRG ultimately wants a sustainable, just resolution. There can be no national reconciliation without addressing the disputed territory, he said. There is no justice without rectifying the wrongs committed against victims of former regimes, and Iraq “can’t resolve a crime by committing a crime,” Talabani said. The KRG must show good governance, Talabani said, and it is working on developing a culture of better governance. “We are not Switzerland - yet,” he said.

The final panel of the day, History and Current Situation, included earlier speakers Dr. Kirkuki, Dr. Ihsan, and Dr. Karim, with Dr. Shali as chair. Speakers addressed the importance of protecting the rights of all groups and of building trust.

Source: Kurdish Globe

In Northern Iraq, the Kurds Find Success Amid Struggle

By WILLIAM GRIMES

Published: April 9, 2008

The script for Iraq was supposed to go like this: The dictator topples; the oppressed masses celebrate; democracy takes root; and the United States, showered with gratitude, embraces a new, pro-Western ally in the hostile Middle East.

INVISIBLE NATION

How the Kurds’ Quest for Statehood Is Shaping Iraq and the Middle East

That’s exactly what happened, Quil Lawrence argues in “Invisible Nation,” but you have to look north to see it, in the three Kurdish provinces of Iraq. “Americans now sit transfixed by their entanglement in the horrible civil war unfolding in Arab Iraq, but they scarcely notice that Iraqi Kurdistan is slowly realizing all of America’s stated goals for the region,” he writes.

The Kurds, protected by an American-sponsored no-fly zone during Saddam Hussein’s last years in power, got a head start on the nation-building process that has convulsed the rest of Iraq. Quietly, and happy to be left alone, they have developed a semi-autonomous enclave that is pro-democracy, pro-American and even pro-Israel. It is Muslim but not theocratic. There is no insurgency, and no American soldiers have been killed there. Almost by accident, Mr. Lawrence writes, Iraqi Kurdistan has turned out to be “one of the most successful nation-building projects in American history.”

How this happened is Mr. Lawrence’s subject, as he sifts through events taking place in northern Iraq at a time when the attention of the world was focused on calamitous events farther south. It is a story well worth telling, although Mr. Lawrence, the Middle East correspondent for the BBC/PRI radio program “The World,” offers more of a chronology than a narrative.

He begins, sensibly enough, with a brief overview of Kurdish history and an answer to the irritating question inevitably put to every Kurdish spokesman: What exactly is a Kurd? Much hinges on the reply. For years the Turkish government simply denied the existence of its millions of Kurds, calling them “mountain Turks who have forgotten their language.”

In fact, the Kurds are a distinct, ancient ethnic group with their own non-Arabic language who inhabit parts of Turkey, Syria, Iran and Iraq. Like the Palestinians, they are a people without a homeland and are much less likely than the Palestinians to get one. This is the discordant note in Mr. Lawrence’s otherwise upbeat account, a little-engine-that-could story in which courageous, determined Kurds, overcoming repeated betrayals by the Western powers, manage to create from the ruins of Iraq a virtual state that cannot become actual without throwing the entire Middle East into chaos.

Mr. Lawrence spends most of his time describing the rise of Kurdistan’s two great, clan-based parties and their incessant jockeying for position in the post-Hussein era. The Kurdistan Democratic Party, led since 1975 by Massoud Barzani, competes with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, led by its founder, the exuberant and charismatic Jalal Talabani. Even experts can discern no difference in their programs.

The intrigues and bickering between the two parties defy comprehension, but Mr. Lawrence dutifully notes every twist and turn of events. This quickly becomes tedious. In the end the parties wind up running separate domains within Kurdistan — right down to the region’s two incompatible cellphone networks — with Mr. Barzani as head of the Kurdistan Regional Government, and Mr. Talabani serving as president of Iraq.

On the debit side, both parties operate by cronyism and tolerate levels of corruption that are standard in the Middle East but appalling to Western nations. On the plus side, both have cracked down hard on Islamic extremists. Mr. Lawrence gives a rousing account of the Patriotic Union’s campaign against Ansar al-Islam, a Kurdish Islamist group, with members of the pesh merga, the redoubtable Kurdish militia, fighting together with American special operations troops.

The Americans and the pesh merga worked together well, despite starkly different tactical styles. The Americans liked to move forward deliberately, secure their ground and then call in air strikes for the next assault. The pesh merga, rather than moving the ball down the field 10 yards at a time, preferred to strike suddenly, seize momentum and chase the enemy at high speed, accepting heavy casualties as the price of victory. At the same time, they rarely showed up before 7 a.m. for battle and routinely broke for lunch. Still, the collaboration succeeded.

Mr. Lawrence describes “soft partition” as the Kurds’ best bet. Only 2 percent of Kurds wish to remain part of Iraq, but a declaration of nationhood would bring armed intervention from adjacent powers. By lying low and taking advantage of continuing strife between Sunnis and Shiites, Mr. Lawrence writes, they can continue to develop separately and, with a little luck, persuade the United States to build a permanent military base in Kurdistan.

“The key was to keep American patronage, and to do that, they would need to stay a tiny bit invisible,” Mr. Lawrence writes, reading the mind of the Kurdish leadership. “The Kurds could have a country in everything but name, and that way none of the neighbors could accuse them of trying to redraw the map.”

For the first time in nearly a century the Kurds hold a winning hand — from which they need to discard the trump card of nationhood. Mr. Lawrence, a sympathetic but not uncritical observer, makes it easy to root for a people whose struggle has long seemed, to quote Neville Chamberlain on Czechoslovakia, “a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing.” For a change, the Kurds now have a chance at something.

Source: New York Times

BIDEN on Iraq: What Will The Region Look Like in 2012?

April 3, 2008

BIDEN: “We cannot continue to make it up as we go along. We must mark a direction on our strategic compass — and deliberately move in that direction.”

Washington, DC – Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE) held the Committee’s third Iraq hearing of the week, entitled “Iraq 2012: What Can It Look Like, How Do We Get There?” The witnesses this morning compromised of experts with a profound understanding of the social, sectarian and political dynamics inside Iraq and in the region. The full panel included Professor Carole O’Leary of American University; Dr. Dawn Brancati of Harvard University; Ambassador Carlos Pascual of the Brookings Institute; Dr. Greg Gause of the University of Vermont; and Dr. Terrence Kelly of the RAND Corporation.

The witnesses offered insight as to what they believe Iraq might look like four years from now and what policies the United States should pursue inside Iraq, in the region and beyond to help Iraq get there.

Next Tuesday, when the Foreign Relations Committee reconvenes, they will hear testimony from Ambassador Crocker and General Petraeus. The question they will have to answer with is “After the Surge: What Next?”

The full text of Sen. Biden’s opening statement, as prepared for delivery, is below:

“In some ways, this session is the most important we will have during these two weeks of hearings on Iraq. Before the war began, this Committee warned that the failure to plan and define realistic objectives in Iraq would cause us to pay a heavy price.

“We cannot continue to make it up as we go along. We must mark a direction on our strategic compass — and deliberately move in that direction.

“Ironically, despite all the debate in Washington and beyond about our Iraq policy, there is one premise just about everyone shares: lasting stability will come to Iraq only through a political settlement among its warring factions. So the single most important question you would think we would be debating is this: what political arrangements might Iraqis agree to and what are the building blocks to achieve them?

“Yet we almost never ask ourselves those questions. Today we will.

“We’ve asked each of you to think ahead: in a reasonable, best case scenario, what might Iraq look like politically four years from now, in 2012, and what policies should we pursue now — inside Iraq, in the region and beyond — to help Iraq get there?

“My own view, as my colleagues know all too well, is this: absent an occupation we cannot sustain or the return of a dictator we cannot want, Iraq will not be governed from the center at this point in its history. I believe Iraq’s best chance to remain unified and stable is through a decentralized system of government that devolves considerable power to the local and regional levels, but that has a real, identifiable, and effective central government. In a word: federalism.

“We cannot impose this or any other solution on Iraqis – and we don’t have to because federalism is enshrined in the Iraqi constitution. And it is a vision my colleagues in the Senate and House have endorsed and put into our law. I am not wedded to my plan. If there is a better way to meet our objective of leaving Iraq without leaving chaos behind, I will support it.

“As important as defining the objective is how we get there. It is critical, in my view, that we establish a process that gets Iraq’s neighbors and the world’s major powers much more actively involved in helping Iraqis arrive at a political accommodation. Our influence in Iraq is a waning asset. The influence of Iraq’s neighbors and the major powers is a wasted asset.

“I look forward to hearing from our witnesses, who have given great thought to a vision of the future Iraqis might share and how the international community can help them realize it.

“Professor Carole O’Leary is Program Director and Scholar in Residence at the Center for Global Peace at American University. Dr. Dawn Brancati is a Fellow at the Institute of Quantitative Social Studies at Harvard University. Dr. Gregory Gause is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Vermont. Dr. Terrence Kelly is Senior Operations Researcher at RAND Corporation. And Ambassador Carlos Pascual is Vice President and Director of Foreign Policy at Brookings Institution.

“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for being here.”

Source: biden.senate.gov

U.S. envoy to Iraq supports federal system

By Qassim Khidhir
The Kurdish Globe

Jay Garner still believes it is best for the war-torn country.

Wednesday, 02 April 2008, 09:37 EDT

After originally espousing a federal system at the outset of the U.S.-led war in Iraq, Garner was dismissed by Washington’s top leaders.

Jay Garner, the first top U.S. civilian administrator of post-war Iraq who was replaced by Paul Bremer, says the best plan for Iraq is to have a soft central government with a federal system, including one federal region each for Kurds, Sunnis, and Shiites.

“I thought over time one of two things would happen if we did that; either the federal districts would grow together into one unified federation with the stronger central government, or they would go on their on way. Both ways are democratic,” Garner told The Kurdish Globe.

Garner said in 2003 he had a plan for Washington for a federal system in Iraq, about which he met with the National Security Advisor in the U.S. at that time, Condoleezza Rice. She responded that it wasn’t the right time to discuss federalism and the discussion ended there.

When Garner first visited Iraq, he asked Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and Massoud Barzani, now president of Kurdistan Region, to help him gather all Iraqi political leaders in Baghdad for discussions on Iraq’s future.

“Talabani suggested that I should meet al-Hakim, leader of Shiite Council, but I told him I was a little bit uneasy about al-Hakim,” said Garner. “He said, look Jay, it is better to have al-Hakim with you inside the tent than outside the tent. I told him that was very good advice. After one week I started to see Iraqi leaders every day and I met al-Hakim many times.”

Garner planned to do several things in Iraq urgently in the beginning, including end the fuel crisis, pay the army, police, and retired community, elect a city council, bring the ministries back to full service, and increase the capacity of electricity.

Garner said after a short time in Iraq, Donald Rumsfeld, the former U.S. Secretary of Defense, told him that President George W. Bush selected Paul Bremer to be the U.S. envoy in Iraq.

He believes that Kurdistan is a good example for the rest of Iraq, and he said if the next U.S. president pulls the American army out it will create chaos. Because they train Iraqi security and how Iraq presently runs itself, it is better that the U.S. stay for awhile, he said.

Colin Powell, former U.S. Secretary of State, and Lt. Gen. David McKiernan, the top military leader in Baghdad at the time, have both said they were not consulted about the decision in May 2003 to disband the Iraqi army.

Lt. Gen. McKiernan has gone as far as to state that Bremer’s claims otherwise are “absolutely false.”

Disbanding Iraq’s army now ranks as the most important factor behind the rise of the insurgency, which has contributed to the deaths of 3,988 U.S. and 174 British troops.

Mr. Bremer has argued that the army had already disbanded itself, but just weeks earlier Lt. Gen. McKiernan’s staff had warned against the consequences of putting 300,000 trained fighters “on the streets.”

Andy Bearpark, a former private secretary to Baroness Thatcher and a director of Bremer’s Coalition Provisional Authority, told the British Daily Telegraph: “One of the tragedies was that the Brits were so light in their impact. Bremer just didn’t want any of their voices getting in the way of his decisions.”

On the fifth anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion, Kurdistan’s President Barzani described overthrowing Saddam as a historical event and strongly criticized Paul Bremer’s policy in Iraq.

Barzani said the first time he and other Iraqi political leaders met Bremer, he said: “The word “invasion” is ugly, but it is a fact and I hope you can live with it. I will consult you, but it doesn’t mean that I will do things according to your advice.” Barzani said Bremer had little information about Iraq and the Middle East and he was not ready listen to anyone.

“His American and Iraqi advisors who accompanied him to Iraq told him that the Iraqi political parties have no more roles in Iraq and he can issue any decision without facing any objection,” said
Barzani.

Source: Kurdish Globe

President Bush talks about federalism in Iraq!

Remarks by President Bush on Iraq’s Progress

THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
(Dayton, Ohio)
March 27, 2008

In February, leaders [of Iraq] enacted a budget that increases spending on security capital reconstruction projects and provincial governments. And on the same day, leaders enacted an amnesty law to resolve the status of many Iraqis held in Iraqi custody. Last week, leaders reached agreement on a provincial powers law that helps define Iraqi federalism, and sets the stage for provincial elections later this year. And that’s an important piece of legislation because it will give Iraqis who boycotted the last provincial election — such as Sunnis in Anbar or Ninewa provinces — a chance to go to the polls and have a voice in their future.

These pieces of legislation deal with complex issues that are vital for the reconciliation of the country, and fundamental for a democratic society. I mean, we’ve been arguing about the role of the federal government relative to the states for a long time here in America. We’ve been trying to get the balance right. There’s a constant struggle between the proper role of state and local government versus the role of the federal government. Well, that’s what the Iraqis are now struggling through.

Source: America.gov

 

Iraq’s British-made dictatorial flag still has fans!

Iraq flag debate still flutters

Iraqis plan to vote on a new flag by the end of 2008.

from the March 24, 2008 edition

In 2004, the US-led occupation authority commissioned Rifat Chadirji to design a new Iraqi flag. The flag would have replaced a Saddam Hussein-era one: A red, white, and black flag that had three stars and Hussein’s own script reading, “Allahu Akbar,” or “God is Greatest.”

Of the six options Mr. Chadirji submitted, the one chosen was a white banner with a blue crescent and three stripes at the bottom. The two blue ones meant to symbolize the Euphrates and Tigris rivers and the yellow stripe was a nod to the Kurds, given their attachment to the color, Chadirji says. The crescent had been one of the most an important symbol for the Sumerians.

The highly controversial flag was assailed by many, mostly for being too similar to the Israeli flag. It never flew.

The old flag remained and Hussein’s script was changed to a Kufic script. Nevertheless, Kurds in the northern semiautonomous region banned the revised flag, flying only the Kurdish flag and saying the revised flag was still reminiscent of the Hussein-era one.

And in February, Iraqi leaders agreed remove the stars altogether.

But Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish parliamentarian, says the arrangement was only temporary. “This looks awkward,” he says, “but this is Iraq – anything can happen.”

In early February, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki took part in a flag-raising ceremony inside the Green Zone. “Adopting the new flag is a positive step toward national unity and erases the past crimes, mass graves, and human rights abuses committed under the previous banner,” Mr. Maliki said.

But many Sunni Arabs in Anbar Province reject the temporary flag, especially the newly assertive tribal sheikhs.

“They are insulting us,” says Sheikh Ali al-Hatem al-Sulieman, a leader of the Dulaim tribal confederation that dominates Anbar. “The flag will not change in Anbar, Baghdad, Salaheddin, Mosul, or Diyala. We will not replace it.”

By the end of 2008, Iraqis are expected to vote in a referendum on another new flag design. The first flag was designed by British administrator Gertrude Bell and was inspired by the banners of the Arab tribes that were backed by the British in their revolt against the Ottomans.

Source: The Christian Science Monitor

Happy New Babylonian Year!

This Friday: the New Year in Southern Iraq!

03/18/2008

The people of Southern Iraq are celebrating the New Year this Friday. The celebration is called “Dawrat al-Sana” or “al-Dokhol.” Amazingly, this well-observed tradition by the people of Southern Iraq is, in fact, the Babylonian New Year, the Akitu Festival!

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Akitu Festival

Akitu: the Babylonian New year’s festival, celebrated to honor the supreme god Marduk, his crown prince Nabû and other gods.

The name Akitu is very ancient. In the third millennium BCE, the Sumerian population of southern Mesopotamia celebrated the á-ki-ti-še-gur₁₀-ku₅, the festival of the sowing of barley. It was celebrated in the first month of the year, that is in March/April. In the Babylonian calendar, this month was known as Nisannu (and in the modern Jewish calendar is still called Nisan). Since the festival was celebrated on the first days of the Babylonian year, we can call it a New Year’s festival. In fact, the ancient Babylonians already called it rêš šattim, ‘beginning of the year’.

The festival -better: conglomerate of festivities- was celebrated on two locations in Babylon: in the temple of the supreme god Marduk, the Esagila, and the ‘house of the New year’ which was situated north of the city. The two gods who were in the center of the festival were Nabû and his father, the supreme god Marduk, who was in the first millennium BCE usually called ‘Bêl’, Lord, because his real name was considered too holy to be pronounced.

On 4 Nisannu, the high priest of the Esagila (šešgallu) opened the festival, saying that the new year had begun. To the populace, this meant the beginning of a holiday of a week. On the same day, the king went to the temple of Nabû, where the high priest gave him the royal scepter. He then traveled to Borsippa, a city 17 kilometers downstream from Babylon that had a famous Nabû temple. Here, he spent the night. At the same time, the šešgallu recited the Babylonian creation epic (Enûma eliš) in the house of the New Year.

The fifth of Nisannu saw the king’s return to Babylon, accompanied by the statue of Nabû from Borsippa. The statue was left behind in the Uraš gate, and the king went to the Esagila to greet Marduk. He had to do this humbly, laying down his weapons, crown and scepter. The šešgallu listened to the king’s words that he had not sinned against Marduk and hit him very hard on the cheek (the king had to have tears in his eyes). Perhaps, this was a punishment for sins that were unwillingly committed. Kneeling in front of the statue of Marduk, the king receives an oracle about the glorious future, and was given back his royal insignia. At sunset, the king and the šešgallu performed a not completely understood ritual with a white bull.

Next day, the statue of Nabû visited the temple of Ninurta, where it defeated two enemies (in the form of golden statuettes). Then, it continued to the Esagila, where it joined Marduk’s statue. At the same time, other statues of other gods arrived at Babylon.

On 7 Nisannu, the statues were cleaned and received new dresses. On the next day, the festival reached its climax when all statues were brought out from their rooms and shown to the Babylonian populace. All gods were now present to honor Marduk, and their ‘parliament’ announced its policy for the next year. (One is reminded of the ’state of the union’ speech by the American president.) As far as we know, this policy was always one of blessing, fortune and success. After these joyful tidings, the gods started a tour through the city to the river. Here, they boarded a small fleet, that brought them to the house of the New year. The king himself guided the supreme god. On the last part of the route, the ships were placed on chariots, so that the gods were driven to the house of the New year in ships.

The people were singing all kinds of songs. Three of them can be reconstructed: a frivolous hymn to the goddess of sexuality and love Ištar, a song in which Marduk’s father Enlil was ridiculed as a god in the gutter, and an antiphonal hymn in which the gods were asked why they were not in their temples and replied that they had to be with Marduk.

What happened in the house of the New year on 9-10 Nisannu, is not known, but it seems that sacrifices were made by the king and that the spoils of war were presented to the gods. On 11 Nisannu, the gods returned to the Esagila, where they repeated their parliament. After this, they saw Nabû off, and went home.

The Akitu festival continued for centuries, and not only in Babylon. At the beginning of the third century CE, it was still celebated in Emessa in Syria, to honor the god Elagabal; the Roman emperor Heliogabalus (218-222) even introduced it in Italy.

Literature

K. van der Toorn, ‘Het Babylonische Nieuwjaarsfeest’ in Phoenix. Bulletin van het Vooraziatisch-Egyptisch genootschap Ex Oriente Lux 36/1 (1990) 10-29

Article by Jona Lendering

Source: www.livius.org