Iraqis Couldn't Get Together for Reconciliation Gathering, But Declare Everything OK

This last week after Cheney talked with Maliki a "reconciliation gathering" was held, but unfortunately the Sunnis didn't show up and the Sadr coalition showed up, but walked out right after the meeting was called to order.

See Washington Post "Major Iraqi Blocs Boycott Reconciliation Gathering"

The major problem was reported by the journalists to be:

National reconciliation here has always been primarily about bringing Shiites and Sunnis into closer political partnership, a chief reason the Bush administration increased U.S. troop levels last year. But the boycott of the Baghdad conference by the Iraqi Accordance Front, a Sunni political bloc, illustrated how divided the two groups remain.

...

"We are used to the prime minister speaking in a beautiful way about reconciliation and brotherhood. That's all well, but on the ground there are a lot of obstacles he has put in the way of reconciliation," said Alaa Makki, a Sunni parliament member with the Iraqi Islamic Party, part of the Accordance Front.

Makki said his Sunni colleagues boycotted the conference because certain Sunni political and tribal leaders were not invited. He said the boycott was also meant to underscore the fact that their basic demands -- greater participation in the political process and in the security forces -- remain unmet.

He criticized the government's position of limiting the number of U.S.-backed Sunni volunteer fighters to be incorporated into the predominantly Shiite Iraqi security forces.

"The army is mainly from one component of the Iraqi people, the police also," he said. "We want this to be distributed in a fair way and to give us chances to have a role in controlling security, at least in our provinces."

But by the next day the New York Times reports in "Iraqi Council Ends Objection to Election Law ": 

A member of Iraq’s Presidency Council, whose objections had blocked a law calling for provincial elections by October, withdrew his objections on Wednesday in a sudden turnaround that raised hopes for long-sought political progress.

...

The legislation, passed with great fanfare in early February, was rejected by the council on Feb. 27 and sent back to Parliament after Vice President Adel Abdul Mehdi said it was unconstitutional. President Jalal Talabani and Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi also sit on the three-member council.

Mr. Mehdi’s reversal came two days after he met with Vice President Dick Cheney, who was in Iraq. In the view of American officials, the law, which was intended in part to correct electoral distortions that had given Kurds and Shiites disproportionate power in some regions dominated by Sunni Arabs, could in theory help defuse the power of the Sunni insurgency. Local council members were chosen in elections largely boycotted by Sunni Arabs.

This nice announcement by the Iraqis is made hoping you will be fooled into thinking that everything is now okay, but in fact, the little bit about oil revinues dispersal and more access to governement jobs including security positions as noted above in excerpt from the Post report.

Want to know what I think?:  

The Shia of Iraq are like a sister who has fought for years to win the entire estate of her deceased father who had been very wealthy.

When she succeeds starts to bawl loudly with desperate melancholy.  

She is asked why she's crying and replies that now her dear brothers and sisters are going to starve and they'll be blaming her for their fates.

But then again we do see the same kind of demagoguery coming from the Bush administration and many of our allies, don't we?

There is, of course, more than enough to share in Iraq even with the reduced output of oil, even if they have to take on extra governmental jobs for a while just to keep people employed.  For pity sake oil is selling at a price that would have even satisfied Saddam!  Are they just greedy, determined to destroy the Sunnis, or is the US still pressing on them to privatize everything?

 The oil redistribution legislation still hasn't be resolved either.

If the announcement by the government turns out to be true, that's still only one part of what they need to do to reconcile their factions.  There is also the matter of building or finding homes for all those that have been driven from their homes by the forced sectarian divide that has gone on.   Hey, Guys, that's a way to put people to work.

Seventeen months ago they promised to get right on this.

That was more than 1000 deaths of US armed forces wasn't it?

tags: iraq  sunnis  shia  oil prices  

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