THE HANDSTAND

THE HANDSTAND

JUly 2004

Grand Ayatollah Ali al Husseini al-Sistani, demanded either elections or U.N. involvement; So we may now
presume UN involvement is over....?

UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi

The intervention of UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi in the transition of power phase in occupied Iraq, at the behest of the US and the UK, has been almost universally praised in the Arab world - and much of the Western world - as a welcome step in an unfolding political and geostrategic drama.

But this is not how the Iraqis - in particular the long-oppressed Shiite majority - see it. There is, at the least, a deep suspicion that Brahimi wishes to limit the extent and intensity of the transformation of Iraq from a tyranny dominated mainly by a minority Sunni elite to a reasonably representative polity at ease with itself and its neighbors. At worst Brahimi is seen as the loyal representative of the "Arab order," pushing an Arab nationalist agenda. Indeed many Shiites express this fear and strongly suspect Brahimi of trying to sabotage their legitimate aspirations in the new Iraq.

Brahimi's diplomatic career is one reason why his critics believe he is unsuitable for the role of UN envoy in Iraq. He has been a perennially loyal representative of Algeria's Front de Liberation National (FLN). When the Algerian military staged a coup in January 1992 to prevent an impending Islamist victory at the polls, Brahimi was Algeria's foreign minister. He was tasked with explaining the reasons for this to the outside world, as well as for the horrors that followed the suspension of democracy in the country.

Prior to his post as foreign minister, Brahimi served as undersecretary-general of the Arab League from 1984 to 1991. However, his ties to the pan-Arab body dated back to the 1960s, when Brahimi was Algeria's permanent representative in Cairo. He thus received a thorough schooling in the diplomatic methods of the "Arab order."

Brahimi's demeanor betrays his background. He often finds it difficult to articulate his positions when probed by skillful interviewers. Yet his verbal awkwardness stems less from a lack of talent for prose than an innate discomfort with having to outline and defend his positions in public. Brahimi is very much a back room wheeler-dealer, and it is most unfortunate for Iraqis, who have, in theory at least, been promised a chance to participate more openly in shaping their political future, that the UN envoy is pursuing such methods in their country.

Brahimi's declared intentions for Iraq leave little to the imagination. His persistence in forming a "technocratic government" as the primary vehicle in the transition process has been dismissed as a smokescreen for restoring Iraq's Sunni Arab elite to center stage. Moreover, Brahimi's insistence on "security" as the primary prerequisite for the successful transfer of power, though an understandable demand, could help revive the fortunes of Sunnis who played such an essential role in Saddam Hussein's military and security apparatus.

Brahimi, like other Arab nationalists both inside Iraq and outside, is clamoring for the revival of the old Iraqi Army and other security institutions. He likes to cite the example of Fallujah, where the US was forced to revive elements of the old army to restore peace, as key to the restoration of security in Iraq. These measures may deliver short-term respite for the Americans, but in the middle to long term they imperil the US project in Iraq.

The Shiites of Iraq, despite their divisions, have been wary of the Brahimi plan. Brahimi's supporters have often highlighted the opposition of Ahmed Chalabi to the envoy - in the hope that Chalabi's lack of credibility inside Iraq and beyond would boost Brahimi's. Yet this cannot disguise the fact that every single major Iraqi Shiite organization has questioned Brahimi's motives.

I recently spoke to Ghanem Javad of the Al-Khoei Foundation in London. Javad was incensed by Brahimi's intervention in Iraqi politics and the rapturous applause he has received in the Arab world
and from many quarters in the West. Brahimi, Javad insisted in a now- familiar critique, was the ambassador of the "Arab order," an order that has traditionally oppressed the Shiites. The reference to the Arab order was instructive insofar as it highlighted the sensitivities and idiosyncrasies of the Iraqi Shiite community. That's because Iraqi Shiites are receptive to Iranian influence in their traditions - which should be distinguished from Iranian ideological influence, which many Iraqi Shiites find divisive.

The real question is whether Brahimi will inflict real damage on the important experiment that is unfolding in Iraq. One must note that the US only called upon the UN to help in the transitional phase out of desperation. Washington could have done much better by engaging Iraqis instead, mainly representatives of Ayatollah Ali Sistani. While Sistani's insistence on early elections may have been unworkable, there was every likelihood that the US-led coalition could have arrived at a compromise with him had they pursued the dialogue longer.

Instead the US, taken aback by the resistance put up by insurgents in Fallujah and the other crises it has faced, has apparently backtracked from some of its commitments in Iraq. Calling for Brahimi's intercession may have indeed been an attempt to placate Iraq's Sunnis. Yet this policy of trying to please everyone, while reasonable in the short term, may ultimately lead to failure in Iraq.
By Mahan Abedin is a London-based analyst of Middle Eastern politics.
The Daily Star
Tuesday, June 01, 2004

political observations and resignation

The United Nations special envoy has called on the incoming Iraqi government to broaden discussions to include Iraqis who oppose the US occupation. He also suggested his authority in shaping the new government had been severely limited by US officials.

Lakhdar Brahimi said the US was pursuing a strategy that relied too heavily on force and not enough on subtlety and persuasion. "I think it's a little bit too easy to call everybody a terrorist," he said on Wednesday. "And I think if you find out that there are people who are not terrorists who are respectable, genuine Iraqi patriots you must find a way of talking to them."

He said he might have done things differently if he had been given a freer hand in setting up the new government that was unveiled on Tuesday. Asked about the selection of Prime Minister, Ayad Allawi, which became a divisive affair, he alluded to the role of the US administrator, Paul Bremer.

"I sometimes say - I'm sure he doesn't mind my saying it - Bremer is the dictator of Iraq," Mr Brahimi said. "He has the money. He has the signature. Nothing happens without his agreement in this country."

Mr Brahimi gave muted endorsement of the new government, headed by President Ghazi Yawar, who is a middle-aged tribal sheik, and Dr Allawi, who is an opposition politician long backed by the CIA.

"I believe this government is the best that we can reach right now," Mr Brahimi said.

Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations special envoy to Iraq, announced his resignation from the post at a meeting yesterday of the Security Council and in the presence of Secretary General Kofi Annan, June 13th. The resignation, brewing for a number of days, shocked the diplomatic community at the world body.

Brahimi explained that his decision stemmed from great difficulties and frustration experienced during his assignment in Iraq. He said that he does not intend to return to Iraq
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BAGHDAD, Iraq - Lakhdar Brahimi, wrapping up his U.N. mission to bring an interim government to Iraq, looked a little tired and disheartened Wednesday as he said the compromise he negotiated was the best possible under American control.

"Bremer is the dictator of Iraq," he said. "He has the money. He has the signature."

He later added: "I will not say who was my first choice, and who was not my first choice ... I will remind you that the Americans are governing this country."

Sadoun al Dulame, the head of a Baghdad research organization and polling center, said he spoke with Brahimi last week and that the diplomat was discouraged.

"He was very disappointed, very frustrated," al Dulame said. "I asked him why he didn't say that publicly (and) he said, `I am the U.N. envoy to Iraq, how can I admit to failure?'"

Brahimi arrived in Iraq in February with orders to evaluate whether elections were feasible in the short term and, if not, to find an alternative.

A vague U.S. caucus plan had fallen through because of opposition from Iraq's top Shiite Muslim cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al Husseini al-Sistani, who demanded either elections or U.N. involvement. Tens of thousands of Shiites had marched through Baghdad the month before, many of them threatening violent revolt if there were no elections. Brahimi spent a lot of his time in Iraq listening to Iraqis from all walks of life and pieced together an expansive, nuanced picture of the nation and its needs. He concluded that immediate elections wouldn't work. By Tom Lasseter

THE COLONIAL IMAGE REPRODUCED?... COLLABORATION
Verbal attacks against the American occupation contain a semblance of nationalism; a very particular form of nationalism, one that I called in a previous article benign nationalism. If the colonial power redefined the colonized nation, the nationalism that emerges from accepting such a redefinition would be harmless to the colonial power, a continuation rather than an antithesis of occupation.

This was exactly the case with the nationalisms that developed around entities like Egypt and Lebanon as they were severed form the Ottoman Empire and redefined by British and French occupations. Instead of an Ottoman autonomous governorate, Egypt, with the efforts of the British became a constitutional monarchy. The British declared that they wanted Egypt to be a parliamentary democracy modeled after Great Britain, only under occupation.

The leaders of the Egyptian nationalist movement of the early 20th century accepted that redefined image of Egypt and tailored their national discourse around it. Not only was the nationalist discourse a derivative of the colonial discourse, the men and women who led the nationalist movement were historically collaborators with the colonial power.

According to the treaty of London which defined Egypt's autonomy within the Ottoman Empire, the system of inheritance in the treaty gave the throne to the eldest male descendant...... The men and women on the Iraqi governing council should know that they cannot play the British game again precisely because it has already been played before. Their verbal attacks against the American occupation should fool no one, they do not oppose the occupation because they are the occupation's enemies, rather, they oppose it because they compete with it and they think they should be the ones to occupy Iraq instead of the Americans ... but it would still be an occupation!
by Tamim al-Barghouti is a Palestinian poet.