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| Iraq's Kurds threat to quit government not serious: observers |
| | www.chinaview.cn 2004-06-11 11:15:45 |
By Muhsen Hussein, Laith Salman
BAGHDAD, June 10 (Xinhuanet) -- Most observers of the Iraqi situation agreed that the threats of the Kurdish leaders to withdraw from the Iraqi interim government were not serious and they only wanted to pressure Washington.
What they really wanted was to obtain the recognition of the State Administration Law through the UN Security Council's resolution. The interim constitution stirred great controversy by giving a minority the right to veto the decision of the majority.
The threat was contained in messages by the two Kurdish leaders,Massoud Barzani, head of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan, and Jalal Talabani, head of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, to American president George W. Bush while the UN Security Council was
in session to look into a draft resolution about the future of Iraq.
The threatening tone of the Kurdish officials has now disappeared and they announced that they would discuss the issue with the Kurdish political powers, which is expected to be positive as well.
"The resolution of the Security Council number 1546 identified Iraq as a unified federal republic, which gives a margin for the Kurdish leadership to change its flexible attitude," said Mahmood Uthman, the independent Kurdish politician.
"The two Kurdish parties would loose a lot if they carried out their threat and withdrew their ministers form the interim Iraqi government," he added.
The Kurds in the interim government have the position of vice president and deputy Prime Minister, in addition to six ministries.
Arab parties in the government and outside it hurried to reassure the Kurds the guarantee of their rights, for the Prime Minister Ayad Allawy announced in a press release Wednesday that his government is fully committed to the State Administration Law in the temporary interim phase.
Meanwhile, the religious references for the Shiite Muslims in Najaf, 180 km south of Baghdad, welcomed the new UN Security Council resolution for not containing reference to that law in accordance with a letter from senior Shiite leader Great Ayatollah Ali Al Sistani to the head of the Security Council.
The letter expressed exclamation from the Kurdish threat to withdraw from the political process if their demands were not met by listing the State Administration Law in the Security Council resolution.
The Shiite references said in a statement published Thursday that "it emphasizes that its attitude is not directed against Kurds, that they have its respect and appreciation, and that their legitimate rights would be achieved and conserved through the legal frameworks and it would receive the support of the references."
Sistani had notifies the Security Council's chairman in a letter on June 6 the refusal of the majority of the Iraqi citizens to give international legitimacy to the State Administration Law for the interim period by mentioning it in the resolution.
In the letter, Al Sistani said that "any attempt to give legitimacy to this (resolution) by mentioning it in the international resolution would and act against the will of the Iraqi people, and would bring serious consequences."
This appeared very clearly in the demonstration that started from Baghdad last Tuesday in support of the reference's attitude.
The Kurdish politician Fawzi Al Atroshi thinks that the Kurds have a number of reservations to the resolution of the Security Council, but there are no strong objections to it in the Kurdish street.
Nisreen Brwari, the Kurdish minister of the Iraqi Ministry of General Labor, said that she felt disappointed from the US not as a Kurdish but as a woman, for it was not what she has been fighting and sacrificing for.
"The resolution of the Security Council tried to get out of a crisis of the disputes with a medium solution that admitted to the Kurds of the federation hoping that they would be satisfied, and neglected mentioning the State Administration Law hoping to satisfy
Al Sistani," said local newspaper Al Sabah Thursday. Enditem |
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