U.S. sticks with Iraq timeline
Sat Jan 17,11:40 AM ET
URL:http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2027&ncid=2027&e=1&u=/chitrib_ts/20040117/ts_chicagotrib/usstickswithiraqtimeline
By Stephen J. Hedges, Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- The top U.S. administrator in Iraq (news - web sites) said Friday that the Bush administration may alter its plan for selecting an interim Iraqi government but that the June 30 date would hold, despite pressure from Iraq's Shiite majority to have general elections sooner.
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"It's quite clear that the Iraqi people also are anxious to get sovereignty back," Paul Bremer said after a White House meeting with President Bush (news - web sites). "And we're not anxious to extend our period of occupation as the occupation authority past June 30. So we're intending to stick to the timeline that we have laid out."
In fact, Bremer said he expected to give up the administrator's job and return to private life on July 1.
Nevertheless, he allowed that the details of transition--either the selection of an interim government or nationwide popular elections--have yet to be worked out.
"There obviously are a number of ways in which these kinds of elections can go forward," he said. "We have always said we're willing to consider refinements, and that's something that we will be willing to discuss at the appropriate time."
That time may be growing short. On Friday, supporters of Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani continued their call for nationwide elections that would put power in the hands of Iraqis before the U.S.-mandated timeframe.
Bremer and other U.S. officials say that such elections are a practical impossibility. No Iraqi voter registration or census has begun, a necessary first step toward holding fair elections, they say. They also argue that premature national elections would invite chaos and present security issues, possibly putting those loyal to former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) back into power.
"Some things violate the laws of physics," said one senior administration official deeply involved in the Iraq situation. "You can't do a census, you can't do voter rolls, you can't get everything set up in time. It's physically impossible."
Guaranteeing fair election
Judith Yaphe, a senior research fellow at the National Defense University in Washington and a former CIA (news - web sites) senior Middle East analyst, said al-Sistani and his supporters have yet to address how fair and peaceful elections could be held in the near term.
"What is not being said is that, if we were to hold an election, how can we guarantee a safe and honest one?" Yaphe asked. "How can we prevent voter fraud and the militias and other powerful groups from interfering?"
Bremer returned to Washington on Thursday to confer with Bush and his advisers about the election plans and Iraqi reconstruction. He is due to visit the United Nations (news - web sites) on Monday, when he will meet with Secretary General Kofi Annan (news - web sites) and leaders of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council.
One U.S. official said that Bremer will ask Annan to send a team of UN election specialists to Iraq to help determine how the interim election process should be conducted and how soon general elections could be held.
The UN, which left Iraq in October after a devastating suicide truck bomb killed 22 of its employees in August, has recently dispatched a security team in hopes of re-establishing its presence in Baghdad.
Like Bremer, Annan believes there is not enough time to conduct valid general elections in the coming months, as al-Sistani and his supporters have sought. Bremer reiterated Annan's position Friday, noting that "the UN has a lot of expertise in organizing elections, electoral commissions, electoral laws, has a great deal of expertise it can bring to bear on the process of writing a constitution."
After the U.S. invasion of Iraq and ouster of Hussein last spring, the administration had planned for Iraq to adopt a constitution by this April and then move to select a government. A 25-member Governing Council, many of whose members returned to Iraq after years in exile, was established in the interim.
But pressure for a faster U.S. withdrawal mounted during the summer and fall as attacks continued against U.S. forces and Iraqis working with the Americans. In response, the Governing Council on Nov. 15 adopted an administration plan that called for the selection of an interim government by June 30. That government would then organize general elections that could be held in 2005.
The interim government would be elected by representatives selected in caucuses throughout Iraq.
30,000 march in support
But al-Sistani, who earlier endorsed the U.S. call for a secular government, has urged his followers to support a speedier election process that would put power in Iraqi hands in the next few months.
An estimated 30,000 supporters of al-Sistani marched in the southern Iraqi city of Basra on Thursday in a call for immediate elections, chanting "No to America." On Friday, a cleric and aide to al-Sistani chastised the U.S. plan as a "hasty agreement" to help Bush's re-election prospects, The Associated Press reported.
Cleric Ali Abdul Hakim al-Safi sent a letter to Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites) questioning the sincerity of the power transfer plan.
"Many political analysts are saying that the purpose of the hasty agreement ... was propaganda for your re-election campaign, especially after what your country has suffered because of military losses in Iraq," he wrote. "All we are looking for and want is that our rights not be ignored and the rights of others not be ignored. We know that all the excuses you used to hinder the elections are not based in reality."
Another aide to al-Sistani said Thursday in Kuwait that if the cleric's advice is rejected, a Muslim fatwa, or edict, would be issued that would deny legitimacy to any council elected under the American plan, The Associated Press reported.
On Friday, a representative of al-Sistani threatened to trigger strikes if election demands are not met.
"In the coming days and months, we're going to see protests and strikes and civil disobedience and perhaps confrontations with the occupying force if it insists on its colonial and diabolical plans to design the country's politics for its own interests," Sheik Abdel Mahdi al-Karbalai told worshipers in Karbala, Agence France-Presse reported.
Some Iraq experts contend that the U.S. timetable for turning over power has always been longer than many Iraqis will tolerate.
Given that, al-Sistani's call for elections could resonate with a public already frustrated by the slow return of reliable utility services and security.
"What people are now grumbling about -- `We don't have this, we don't have that, the Americans promised to fix this' -- are issues that they can rally around," Yaphe said |
