Iraqis Move Closer To Civil War In Constitution Clash

by Ferry Biedermann

(IPS) -- The three main groups negotiating Iraq's new constitution have indicated that they have made little headway on the issues that led parliament to extend the deadline for submitting the draft by a week until Aug. 22. The unresolved issues are mainly federalism and the role of Islam.

On Wednesday the main Sunni Arab party, the Iraqi Islamic party, criticized the committee that is writing the new set of basic laws, in which it is also participating, as biased and chaotic.

Its objections highlight the fact that Sunnis object more to the new order in Iraq than the other two groups, the Shiites and the Kurds. It is Sunni groups that are largely behind the insurgency.

The position taken by the Sunnis seems for now crucial to the future of Iraq, although once their grievances have been addressed other problems could emerge. But so far it has been suggested that the United States deems it of the utmost importance that Sunnis approve the new draft constitution. It hopes that a successful political settlement will draw the sting out of the insurgency.

The same hopes were voiced before and immediately after the first parliamentary elections in January. But then the Sunnis largely stayed away, gaining very little representation in parliament and subsequently in the constitutional committee. By the time the other two groups agreed to an expanded Sunni delegation to the committee, the time left for negotiations was severely shortened.

Shiite representatives have indicated that they may try to push through a draft without the approval of the Sunni delegates. They appear to think that the negotiators are more radical than the Sunni population in general, or that they feel unable to make concessions because they were appointed rather than elected.

But given the strength of the insurgency and the mood among the population, it seems a vain hope that Sunni people will agree to something their leaders have rejected.

Each of the three main groups can in effect veto the constitution in a referendum that is scheduled to take place in October.

It may be a Herculean task to get Sunnis to agree to any new constitution at all. They feel politically disadvantaged in the new arrangement in Iraq; the president is a Kurd and the prime minister a Shiite. They fear the constitution will bring further territorial and economic erosion of their position.

The main cause of their worry is the envisioned federal, decentralized structure. The Kurds have exercized de facto autonomy in their small enclave in the north since the Kuwait war of 1991. Now Shiites, who form the majority, are pushing for their own area in the south.

The south has most of the oil riches and the only outlet to the sea. The Sunnis worry that whatever arrangements are made for sharing the oil income, a federal structure would leave them behind in benefits and also by way of jobs and infrastructure that these resources generate. In the old, centrally controlled structure, most of this accrued to them.

Sunni leaders say they have fewer problems with Kurdish autonomy, but are dead set against inclusion of the oil rich northern city Kirkuk within that area as the Kurds are demanding.

The Kurds say they want to postpone discussion of this issue. But the Sunnis want assurances now that there will be no attempts to take the northern oil as well from them.

It may be tempting to the U.S. ambassador to urge the other two groups to make concessions to the Sunnis, so that they feel included in the future Iraq. U.S. officials have been talking about continued central control over oil resources.

But this may lead to a deterioration of U.S. relations with the Kurds, who have been the mainstay of the whole U.S. operation in Iraq, and with the Shiites, who so far have gone reluctantly along.

The Kurds say their future lies within a federal Iraq, but they are loath to allow the central government any powers in their area. They want to keep charge of security and military matters, and they want the option of "self determination," which effectively means complete independence, included in the constitution. That is an absolute red line for the Sunnis.

An issue that divides Kurds from the other two groups is the role of Islam. Both Shiites and the Sunni parties want Islam inscribed as the main source of future legislation. The Kurds, who are Muslim but have a more secular political culture, say Islam should be only one of the sources for legislation.

Women's groups and the U.S. administration are also concerned that too prominent a role for Islam, which will be the state religion anyway, will severely undermine the position of women. The position of women had been relatively good in Iraq compared to the rest of the Arab world.

All this may eventually be resolved, but even in compromise danger lurks, particularly over the federal question.

The Sunnis still have to get used to the idea that they no longer dominate the rest of the country and that they will not automatically benefit from a centralized government structure. The insurgency is deadly, destabilizing and debilitating but given their numbers there is no way the Sunnis would be able to win a civil war.

The most talked about scenario in that case would be the creation of a small Sunni enclave in central Iraq that could become a haven for terrorists, somewhat similar to Afghanistan under the Taliban.

But Sunni acceptance of a weakened central authority in a federal structure could have the same effect. In either scenario, eventually only a total and gruesome combined Kurdish and Shiite victory in a civil war could put an end to such a situation.

It is not certain that a balanced and well considered constitution can help avoid either of these two scenarios, or any other further descent into violence. But that surely must be on the drafters' minds.