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description=6 posts published by Reidar Visser during November 2008;

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the, of, iraq, and, on, is, in, basra, gulf, analysis, archive, for, november, 2008, archives, categories, meta, my, latest, book, amazon, com, twitter, updates, subscribe, recent, posts, withdrawal, treaty, passed, shiite, leaders, disagree, integration, sons, into, army, signs, competition, struggle, about, federalism, an, initiative, to, create, federal, region, launched, obama, administration, question, leverage, iraqi, minorities, get, special, representation, provincial, elections, law,

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iraq isci one of the shiite parties that both the united states and iran consider as one of their main partners in iraq their competing idea of creating a huge nine governorate sectarian shiite region from basra to the border of baghdad has failed to create popular enthusiasm since its launch in august 2005 the formation of basra as a federal region would entail additional difficulties for isci which would face a more complicated roadmap in case they should wish to create a scheme for additional shiite governorates to join the oil rich basra in a super region they do have the option of launching a competing initiative locally in basra this would be followed by a pre referendum poll that would decide which of the schemes should go to a referendum however the modalities for this and in particular the timeline is poorly specified in the october 2006 law and isci seems to enjoy far less support in basra than in najaf where there is almost no oil this lack of legal clarity along with the general trend towards more national attitudes in the iraqi parliament as a whole witness isci s gradual retreat from its pro federal propaganda and nuri al maliki s recent renewed call for a more centralised state means that the future of the basra federal initiative is far from certain some iraqi nationalists consider it to be less harmful than federal schemes that are explicitly sectarian such of that of isci whereas others including many in basra itself think that any extension of the federal principle south of kurdistan remains objectionable posted in basra and southern regionalism comments off on an initiative to create the federal region of basra is launched the obama administration iraq and the question of leverage posted by reidar visser on friday 7 november 2008 15 00 with barack obama s victory in the american presidential elections there are expectations of changes in us policy in iraq involving a substantial reduction of force levels in the so called obama biden plan for iraq this is expressed as follows the removal of our troops will be responsible and phased directed by military commanders on the ground and done in consultation with the iraqi government military experts believe we can safely redeploy combat brigades from iraq at a pace of 1 to 2 brigades a month that would remove them in 16 months under the obama biden plan a residual force will remain in iraq and in the region to conduct targeted counter terrorism missions against al qaeda in iraq and to protect american diplomatic and civilian personnel they will not build permanent bases in iraq but will continue efforts to train and support the iraqi security forces as long as iraqi leaders move toward political reconciliation and away from sectarianism barack obama and joe biden believe that the u s must apply pressure on the iraqi government to work toward real political accommodation there is no military solution to iraq s political differences but the bush administration s blank check approach has failed to press iraq s leaders to take responsibility for their future or to substantially spend their oil revenues on their own reconstruction as our forces redeploy obama and biden will make sure we engage representatives from all levels of iraqi society in and out of government to forge compromises on oil revenue sharing the equitable provision of services federalism the status of disputed territories new elections aid to displaced iraqis and the reform of iraqi security forces so the us forces will withdraw in large numbers but beyond that and of interest to those who care for iraq itself can obama realistically hope to achieve anything other than a unilateral withdrawal such as the ambitious reconciliation aims outlined above much of the answer to this question has to do with the issue of leverage in this regard the obama biden plan embodies several basic assumptions about the motives of the iraqi leadership that were set forward more comprehensively in a report by the center for a new american security in june this year authored by colin kahl michèle flournoy and shawn brimley and titled shaping the iraq inheritance put briefly the democratic view is that nuri al maliki has a strong desire to keep us forces a little longer in iraq so that they can help him strengthen his position by rebuilding the iraqi army accordingly the us should be in a position to offer an extended stay or a residual force more training and advisers as some kind of bonus to maliki this theory is described in the report by kahl et al as conditional engagement what appears to be missing in these assumptions is an appreciation of some of what happened in iraq in 2007 this is not to suggest that the surge was such a wonderful success so far no significant political institutional reform has materialised as a result of the decline in violence without this kind of political reform the surge in itself is worthless because it is based on temporary stop gap measures like an infusion of us troops and the bribing of armed militants however nuri al maliki the person has been enormously strengthened by the surge a year and a half ago any suggestion that maliki would be the next strongman of iraq would be met by ridicule today his emergence as a powerful figure with an increasingly independent position vis à vis his political coalition partners is an undeniable fact the iraqi army is stronger than at any point since 2003 and is becoming a potential tool of repression that many other authoritarian rulers in the region are envious of and maliki has rediscovered an ideological superstructure that is making him increasingly immune against criticism at home using the language of centralism iraqi nationalism and at times anti federalism he has become independent enough to challenge even some of his longstanding coalition partners such as the kurds and the islamic supreme council of iraq isci when it comes to the leverage of the next us administration in iraq the question is not so much about the objective strength of the iraqi army but rather about what nuri al maliki perceives to be his room for manoeuvre in that regard he seems increasingly tied to a nationalist discourse of iraqi sovereignty that takes a critical line with regard to foreign interference hence it seems more and more likely that if faced with an obama offer of conditional engagement maliki s most likely response would be essentially that iraq is an independent country which is not willing to be bullied into constitutional reforms at the behest of foreigners he would be thankful to the americans for their support their support so far in making him a strong ruler but he would feel strong enough to decline the offer of extended support if this comes with too many strings attached a sofa maybe but no more than that he might hope to see his electoral base boosted in local and parliamentary elections or he could turn to the army and other security forces where he has an increasing number of friends failing that he could always turn to iran it may be symptomatic in this regard that the pro iranian daawa tanzim al iraq is part of maliki s new coalition for the local elections even if isci apparently plans to run separately what are the alternatives to conditional engagement in the democratic camp what if maliki feels stronger than us politicians think he is the biden scheme of a grand compromise on federalism has few supporters in iraq south of kurdistan although iran might be interested in the regional aspect of a dayton style settlement where it might exploit the desire of obama to mark a contrast to the bush administration s tough line if obama goes to the opposite extreme in terms of offering iran a regional role iran would emerge stronger than ever and could use its influence with the maliki government to effectively control oil reserves similar in scale to those of saudi arabia however other pro obama groups have worked out policy suggestions that are far better grounded in iraqi realities than the schemes of biden for example the report iraq s political transition after the surge by brian katulis marc lynch and peter juul but they too stake their entire argument on an assumption about the maliki government s perception that may turn out to be incorrect their thesis is quite the opposite of that of kahl et al only the prospect of an early us withdrawal can focus minds on the iraqi side and will force them to make compromises not out of any altruistic motives but because those in power supposedly will feel they need such compromises in order to survive in their current positions again it seems likely that maliki who as early as in 2007 spoke of national reconciliation as something that had already been accomplished may not see the need for any wide ranging reform there are two other iraq alternatives that have received only limited attention by democratic policy makers the first one is exceedingly straightforward and would consist of singling out the 2009 parliamentary elections as the key to reform and iraq s last chance to repair itself the new parliament would then appoint a more representative constitutional revision committee than the current one the united states could focus all its energies on making those elections as inclusive and free and fair as possible and in doing so would be quite immune against accusations of meddling in iraqi affairs the second alternative is more radical and builds on the idea of an externally induced shock as well as exploiting us leverage where it still exists kurdistan political scientist liam anderson has earlier proposed an internationally guaranteed autonomy plus status for kurdistan along the lines of the åland islands in finland by building on this idea one might also create a corollary involving kurdish withdrawal from the constitutional process in the rest of iraq where much of the problem has been artificial alliances between the two biggest kurdish parties and pro federal shiite politicians that enjoy only limited backing in the constituencies they purport to represent and where what is needed is radical recalibration and constitutional reform directed by iraqis who are more representative and who can offer resistance to the attempt by the kurds to impose a pro federal agenda on all of iraq both these approaches come with the advantage that they are much more difficult for nuri al maliki to simply reject and therefore also involve a greater degree of real us leverage posted in us policy in iraq leverage issues comments off on the obama administration iraq and the question of leverage iraqi minorities get special representation in the provincial elections law posted by reidar visser on monday 3 november 2008 18 08 today the iraqi parliament finally passed a long awaited modification of the provincial elections law of 24 september which adds special representation for certain specified ethno religious minorities in certain areas the process towards agreement on these changes has been a tortuous one involving basic disagreements on issues such as state structure and federalism identity questions and gerrymandering of key electoral constituencies to get a sense of what has been at stake in this it may be worthwhile to revisit the first version of the provincial elections law that was adopted on 22 july 2008 in its article 50 13 minority seats were specified roughly half of which were in the kurdistan region and kirkuk and another three in mosul with two seats specifically reserved for yazidis and shabak while kurdish objections against the law at the time above all focused on the contentious article 24 which envisaged radical power sharing in kirkuk it is easy to see that article 50 too was a formidable challenge against the kurdish position in the first place it legislated detailed arrangements for the distribution of seats in the kurdistan regional government krg area the krg position is that the iraqi parliament does not possess authority to make any decisions on those internal affairs of kurdistan which are not enumerated in the constitution as shared powers or the exclusive powers of the federal government hence the decision to exclude kurdistan from the next elections is not something that has been explicitly incorporated in the latest version of the elections law as misreported by many news agencies but rather a decision by the kurdish leadership to ignore it in practice secondly the specific mention of yazidis and shabak was seen as provocative by many kurds who often consider these peoples as kurds with different religious and linguistic traditions some kurds want to assimilate these groups under a wider pan kurdish umbrella and areas inhabited by yazidis and shabak are annexation targets of the krg the next version of the elections law adopted on 24 september focused on achieving some kind of modus vivendi on kirkuk and thereby scrapped the whole issue about minority representation this was followed by an outcry by iraqi minorities and especially christians with swift declarations of solidarity from the entire iraqi political spectrum from the kurds to the sadrists it should be stressed in this context that there is a big difference between minorities and micro minorities in iraqi politics special representation for larger ethno religious groups is frowned upon by most iraqis except the kurds it is for this reason that ethno religious quotas for arab shiites and sunnis and the grey zone case of the turkmens who mostly but not always prefer to compete within the national framework are dismissed as muhasasa and objectionable emulation of the lebanese system conversely special representation for the very small groups is a time honoured tradition which in the case of the christians go back to ottoman system when the only formal distinctions were between muslims christians and jews the same logic has gradually become accepted with regard to the yazidis and the sabaeans and in this last case also the shabak a shiite majority group in northern iraq whose language is similar to kurdish but which claims to have a tradition and history as a distinctive ethnic group during most of october it was believed that the final clauses on minority representation would follow closely the proposal by the un special representative in iraq staffan de mistura in its latest incarnation this plan envisaged the creation of 1 special seat in basra for christians 4 in baghdad 3 for christians and 1 for sabaeans and 7 in mosul 3 for christians 3 for yazidis and 1 for the shabak on 30 october the kurds who had hitherto strongly opposed the designation of the shabak as an independent group and on more than one occasion described this as a plot to divide the kurdish nation expressed satisfaction with this kind of arrangement another report suggested that it was supported by both the kurds and the islamic supreme council of iraq isci also other members of the parliament expressed support like khayrallah al basri a wifaq repres...