JEDDAH, 19 October 2006 — Preparations are under way for the meeting tomorrow between senior Iraqi Sunni and Shiite religious scholars at the Al-Safa Palace overlooking the Grand Mosque in Makkah.
The meeting is set to take place after Taraweeh prayers and is aimed at adopting a formal reconciliation document that calls for ending sectarian violence in Iraq.
The “Makkah Al-Mukarramah Document” will be proclaimed during the last days of the blessed month of Ramadan with the participation of senior Muslim scholars and authorities from Iraq. A press conference will be held after the signing of the document.
The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), which initiated this reconciliation effort, is flying Iraqi delegation members and a media team from Amman to Jeddah today.
Iraqi Shiite and Sunni religious leaders have been in Makkah for most of the week trying to find a way to halt sectarian violence that is threatening to escalate into an all-out civil war. Key leaders of Iraq’s Shiite majority community have given their blessings to the meeting hosted by Saudi Arabia but analysts voiced skepticism about its chances of influencing the sectarian death squads at work in Iraq.
Gathering under the auspices of the 57-member OIC, the summiteers will work from a 10-point text that draws on verses of the Qur’an and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) highlighting that “spilling Muslim blood is forbidden.”
The text also calls for safeguarding the two communities’ holy places, defending the unity and territorial integrity of Iraq and the release of “all innocent detainees.”
An OIC spokesman said the summit was “not a conference or a forum or a venue for negotiations.” Rather, “it is a meeting of the Marjaya (Shiite religious authorities) and Sunni ulema to anoint the document, which will be distributed to Iraqis and publicized in the media. “This initiative aims to quell religious conflict and does not profess to reconcile the protagonists,” he added.
The delegates are expected to include the heads of Iraq’s two religious endowment organizations and a number of leading religious leaders from both sides.
Sources would not name the Iraqi religious scholars who would be attending but assured that they are senior and influential members of both religious sects.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki said he hoped the talks would boost his Shiite-led government’s national reconciliation efforts.
“We pin hopes on every step made by people who care for the interest of Iraq and condemn the terror acts in Iraq,” he said.
Shiite spiritual leader Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani said: “We support this conference and wish it success.”
Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr, whose Mahdi Army militia US commanders accuse of carrying out much of the killing from the Shiite side, said: “I support all conferences that go in line with the interests of Iraq, though I would have preferred it to be held in Iraq.”
But Iraqi academic Dhargham Abdullah Al-Dabbagh predicted the summit would fall flat.
“Of course, the Saudis’ intentions are good, but the meeting is bound to fail. It will have no impact on the ground,” said Dabbagh, a diplomat under the regime of Saddam Hussein who nonetheless spent 16 years in jail.
Whether the meeting will be successful in ending the bloodshed is up to the Iraqis, “but at least we at the OIC tried and the meeting is an initiative that was not attempted before by anyone else,” said the source.
The document calls on every Iraqi to cease infighting and to abide by Islamic principles regarding inter-Muslim violence.
“This is a message that should reach every Iraqi citizen,” said OIC Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu.
The OIC says that the call for reconciliation would be given the broadest possible circulation, to be endorsed and confirmed publicly by all religious bodies, and broadcast and print media.
Preparatory meetings to formulate the reconciliation document were held at the headquarters of the International Islamic Fiqh Academy in Jeddah earlier this month. The Iraqi delegation that participated in the preparatory meeting represented Sunni and Shiite religious scholars. It comprised Sheikh Jalaludeen Al-Saghir, Sheikh Salah Abdul Razaq, Sheikh Abdul Satar Abdul Jabbar Abbas and Sheikh Mahmoud Al-Samidai.
— With input from agencies
