VOL. XLVI
No 48
The Political Scene (1 December 2003)
American plans to speed up the transfer of power to Iraqis suffered a serious setback when the leader of Iraq’s Shi'a majority, Ayatollah 'Ali Sistani, pointed out that they were not quite as democratic as they appeared to be or should be. The IAEA arrived at a compromise on Iran’s nuclear activities, which achieved the rare feat of pleasing both the Americans and the Iranians. The Americans have reduced Israel’s loan guarantees by $290mn.
Ayatollah Sistani’s Spanner In The Works
No sooner had the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) and the CPA-appointed Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) agreed last week on a new scenario for the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqis – which is never, ever to be called an American exit strategy – than the whole plan began to unravel. First, various, but not all, members of the IGC, which agreed to dissolve itself by the end of June next year after the proposed transitional assembly has elected a provisional government, decided that removing themselves from the scene might not be such a good idea after all and that the IGC should be kept on, possibly as a sort of upper house of parliament. This volte-face would be faintly risible, were it not for the fact that it is supported by such IGC members as 'Adil 'Abd al-Mahdi of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) and the Pentagon’s protégé, Ahmad Chalabi. (Mr Chalabi argued on 24 November that “the IGC is the forces that opposed Saddam Husain and, allied with the US, overthrew him. Now the US wants to overthrow us?” To which another – and more realistic – IGC member, Ghazi al-Yawar replied: “They think they are entitled to a role because they believe they overthrew Saddam Husain. It was the US that overthrew Saddam while we were eating TV dinners.”) As for the Americans, they were described by Mr Chalabi as “very surprised” when the proposal was disclosed to them on 23 November.
If there was an air of comic opera about the IGC’s change of mind about relinquishing power (a decision which further reduced its already diminished credibility with ordinary Iraqis), there was nothing frivolous at all about the second setback to the Americans’ plans, an indirect but powerful intervention from the leader of Iraq’s Shi'a majority, Ayatollah 'Ali Sistani. SCIRI leader 'Abd al-'Aziz Hakim emerged from a 26 November meeting with the Ayatollah in Najaf to cite two objections to the CPA-IGC agreement. The first of these, which is probably the easiest to deal with, is that the Ayatollah “didn’t find anything that assures Islamic identity. There should have been a stipulation which prevents legislating anything that contradicts Islam in the new Iraq.” The second, however, casts an unwelcome light on a fundamental flaw in the agreement. According to Mr Hakim, the Ayatollah “expressed concern about real gaps, which must be dealt with or the plan will lack the ability to meet the hopes of the Iraqi people. It diminishes the role of the Iraqi people in the process of transferring authority to Iraqis.” Translated into more specific language, this means that the Ayatollah has spotted the fact that in the 15 November agreement the Americans are essentially trying to manage the selection of the transitional assembly (and thus of the provisional government) through what is described as a “transparent, participatory, democratic process of caucuses” among CPA-appointed local bodies in Iraq’s 18 governorates. Unsurprisingly, Ayatollah Sistani does not see why the transitional assembly should not be elected directly, possibly on the basis of the ration card system established by the UN oil-for-food program.
Ayatollah Sistani may walk softly, but he carries a big stick (or, as Mr Hakim put it, “there will be real problems if the reservations we have expressed are not taken into account”), and his remarks were enough to send IGC chairman Jalal Talabani hurrying to Najaf on 27 November. Mr Talabani emerged from his meeting to say that “Ayatollah Sistani has one reservation only. He wants the Iraqi people to be consulted. He wants elections to be held for the municipal councils as well as the legislative council…He requested that the allies make good on the promises they made to Iraqis. He believes, correctly, that this is a democracy.” Mr Talabani insisted that “the agreement remains, but there is to be an appendix, with other texts. The agreement is developing,” and a similar line was taken by a CPA spokesman who maintained gamely that “we have said all along that this was a framework and we would have to work out the details, and that is what we are going to do going forward.” Nonetheless, there was no concealing the fact that the Ayatollah’s reservations represented a major setback for the Americans’ plans to steer Iraqi democracy in the direction they want. And if the Ayatollah sticks to his guns, it may not be too long before it becomes clear just how real the American commitment to democracy in Iraq is. Meanwhile, as the credibility and popularity of the IGC sink to new depths, Ayatollah Sistani and Kurdish leader Mas'ud Barzani – who has refused to attend IGC meetings – are riding the other end of the seesaw and emerging as the focus of nationalist sentiment and support.
Compromise On Iran At The IAEA
France, Germany and the UK believe that carrots rather than sticks are the best way to persuade the Iranians to keep the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) abreast of their nuclear activities. The Americans, true to form, believe the opposite (the stick in question being UN sanctions). The task facing the 26 November meeting of the IAEA’s board of governors, therefore, was to come up with a resolution which did not cross Iran’s red lines – essentially any reference to non-compliance or possible Security Council action – but was tough enough to satisfy the US. The result, voted through unanimously, “strongly deplores Iran’s past failures and breaches of its obligation to comply with the provisions of its Safeguards Agreement…and urges Iran to adhere strictly to its obligations under its Safeguards Agreement,” at the same time as it “welcomes Iran’s offer of active cooperation and openness and its positive response to the demands of the Board in the resolution adopted by Governors on 12 September 2003” The resolution also warns that “should any further serious Iranian failures come to light, the Board of Governors would meet immediately to consider…all options at its disposal.” So successful was this compromise that for once both Iran and the US managed to agree on something, though for different reasons. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi on 26 November described the resolution as “an achievement for the Islamic Republic of Iran and shows that Iran has carried out its civilian nuclear activities honestly and transparently, and despite the uproar of certain oppressive circles has not sought to manufacture a nuclear weapon.” White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan saw things somewhat differently, saying on the same day that “we welcome that resolution and believe that it underscores the international community’s serious concern with Iran’s nuclear activities and the urgent requirement of Iran to come into full compliance with nuclear non-proliferation obligations…we feel this is a strong resolution, we welcome it, and there is no doubt that it means referral to the UN if there were further failures.”
US Cuts Loan Guarantees
If the purpose of the 25 November decision to deduct $289.5mn from the $3bn in US loan guarantees available to Israel during 2003 in order not to finance activities in the occupied territories that run counter to US policy (and international law) was to persuade anyone that the US was actually going to do something about settlements and the fence, it was a failure. For one thing, the sum was “suggested” by Israel in consultations with the US, with White House spokesman Sean McCormack saying that “this suggestion acknowledges US policy concerns and US law concerning activities in the West Bank and Gaza and is a reflection of close and continuing consultations between our two governments.” For another, the sum involved scarcely even qualifies as a slap on the wrist when compared with the $9bn in US loan guarantees available to the Israelis in 2003, 2004 and 2005. And for a third, Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was only stating the obvious when he said in a radio interview on 26 November that “the fact is they (the Americans) aren’t putting any political pressure on us to do anything on the substantive issues of the political process.”
Charles Snow