Al-Maliki under fire for stoking sectarian rift
IRAQ’s Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki met with President Barack Obama on Nov.1 seeking additional military aid.
Before he reached Washington, key US senators wrote candidly to President Obama, criticizing Al-Maliki for contributing to the sharp increase in sectarian violence in Iraq.
The letter was signed by six senators — two Democrats and four Republicans — who serve on powerful committees in the Senate. The Democrats are Robert Menendez, from New Jersey, who is chairman of the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee and Carl Levin, from Michigan, chairman of the Armed Services Committee. The Republicans include John McCain of Arizona, and Lindsey Graham, from South Carolina, well known for their deep interest in our region. The other two Republicans are Bob Corker, of Tennessee, the top Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee and James Inhofe, from Oklahoma, the ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee.
The letter was a powerful message to both Al-Maliki and Obama from the two most powerful Senate committees. They wanted to put the Iraqi premier on notice that continued US support depended on changing his divisive and sectarian-based policies.
The senators’ letter was quite blunt. They first cited statistics that demonstrated that security conditions in Iraq have “dramatically worsened” over the past two years: In 2010 car bombings declined to an average of 10 a month; in 2013, so far, there has been an average of 68 car bombings a month. They also cited the United Nations estimates that over 7,000 civilians have been killed in Iraq thus far this year — the worst since 2008.
They then delivered this message: “Prime Minister Maliki’s mismanagement of Iraqi politics is contributing to the recent surge of violence. By too often pursuing a sectarian and authoritarian agenda, Prime Minister Maliki and his allies are disenfranchising Sunni Iraqis, marginalyzing Kurdish Iraqis, and alienating the many Shia Iraqis who have a democratic, inclusive, and pluralistic vision for their country. This failure of governance is driving many Sunni Iraqis into the arms of Al-Qaeda in Iraq and fueling the rise of violence, which in turn is radicalizing Shia Iraqi communities and leading many Shia militant groups to remobilize. These were the same conditions that drove Iraq toward civil war during the last decade, and we fear that fate could befall Iraq once again.”
They urged Obama to “make clear to Prime Minister Maliki that the extent of Iran’s malign influence in the Iraqi government is a serious problem in our bilateral relationship, especially for the Congress. Published reports demonstrate that the Iranian regime uses Iraqi airspace to transit military assistance into Syria to support Assad and his forces.”
The senators added: “We must see more evidence from Prime Minister Maliki that US security assistance and arms sales are part of a comprehensive Iraqi strategy that addresses the political sources of the current violence and seeks to bring lasting peace to the country.”
They also asked Obama to “stress with Prime Minister Maliki: If he devises and implements a real governance strategy for Iraq, the United States is ready to provide the appropriate support to help that strategy succeed. Iraq’s challenges will never be solved through security operations alone. Indeed, as the United States learned through its own hard experience in Iraq, applying security solutions to political problems will only make those problems worse.”
The senators said that it was “essential” that Prime Minister Al-Maliki adopted a strategy that “should involve sharing greater national power and revenue with Sunni Iraqis, reconciling with Sunni leaders, and ending de-Baathification and other policies of blanket retribution.”
In an implicit reference to the flawed previous elections, the letter called for “a clear commitment that the elections scheduled for next year will happen freely, fairly, and inclusively in all parts of Iraq, and that the necessary preparations will be taken.”
The senators warned that if Al-Maliki “continues to marginalize the Kurds, alienate many Shia, and treat large numbers of Sunnis as terrorists, no amount of security assistance will be able to bring stability and security to Iraq.”
The senator’s message was certainly not the kind of welcome that Al-Malki had expected in Washington, but he should not have been surprised. He came to the post with US support, despite the fact that he and his party did not garner the largest number of votes. But, since he became prime minister in 2006, his tenure has been marked with divisiveness and stirring sectarian tensions to increase his grip in power, as the senators’ letter noted.
Prior to US withdrawal from Iraq in 2011, the US and Iraq signed a “Strategic Framework Agreement” in 2008 and other documents governing the use of US weapons supplied to Iraq under those agreements.
By virtue of those agreements and the fact that US remains the main supplier of weapons to Iraq, the US has been looked at by many Iraqis as complicit in Al-Maliki’s excessive use of force as he prepares for the upcoming elections in 2014.
Earlier this year, Iraqi government forces were implicated in a number of massacres of peaceful protesters in Sunni-populated towns. For example, and as I wrote in Arab News last May, for several days during the last week of April, about 4,000 peaceful demonstrators in the town of Al-Hawija were surrounded by government forces and denied access to food, water and medical aid. On April 23, troops attacked protesters with live ammunition, tanks and helicopters. About fifty demonstrators were killed and 150 injured in the attack. The attack in Al-Hawija was part of a larger plan to end protests in predominantly Sunni areas.
US Senators are right in expressing alarm about Al-Maliki’s divisive policies and his use of US-supplied weapons in suppressing his opponents. He has created an atmosphere that has made it possible for Al-Qaeda and like-minded terrorists to regroup in Iraq.
It is especially ironic that Al-Maliki is using US military and political support to further the interests of Iran and to help the Syrian regime stay in power, in defiance of declared US policy.
Email: [email protected]
