The Militant (logo)  
   Vol. 69/No. 19           May 16, 2005  
 
 
New Iraqi cabinet is sworn in
 
BY SAM MANUEL  
WASHINGTON, D.C.—The new Iraqi government was sworn in May 3 but several cabinet positions reserved for Sunni politicians remained unfilled. The difficulty the government is having in wooing Sunnis to participate in the new cabinet illustrates the instability of the new regime three months after the January elections for a National Assembly. Part of the dispute is the demand of Sunni politicians that they be given the Defense Department post, which is opposed by the dominant United Iraqi Alliance (UIA).

At the urging of organizations dominated by wealthy Sunnis that had ties to the former Baath Party regime of Saddam Hussein, most Sunnis boycotted the elections. The Association of Muslim Scholars, the main organization of Sunni clerics in Iraq, has criticized the small number of posts set aside for Sunnis in the government and has demanded a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.

During an unannounced visit to Iraq, U.S. defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned against proposals by UIA leaders to purge the security forces of individuals held over from the former Baathist regime.

The UIA won a slight majority of seats in the National Assembly but not enough to form the government on its own. Negotiations over cobbling together a coalition cabinet were marked first by demands of Kurds for broader autonomy in northern Iraq and now by rivalries over posts between the Shiite majority and Sunni minority.

At the heart of the dispute over the defense ministry are differences over how to deal with the armed supporters of the Hussein regime, who have been carrying out bombing attacks on U.S. troops and Iraqi government forces. Wealthy Sunnis are the financial backbone of such groups.

The UIA has rejected several candidates for the defense post proposed by a Sunni negotiating committee headed by Ghazi Yawar, who is also vice president in the new government. Yawar boycotted the swearing-in ceremony in protest. The Yawar-led group also wants to halt the removal of former Baath Party members from government jobs, a return of Sunni officers to the army, and stepped-up efforts to rebuild Falluja.

Iraq’s president, Jalal Talabani, had called for an amnesty and talks with some “insurgent” groups. “I don’t think the insurgency can be beaten by negotiations,” responded top UIA official Hussain Shahristani.

Rumsfeld weighed in on the dispute warning the new regime not to “come in and clean house” in the armed forces.

The regime’s new interior minister, Bayan Jabr, is also a leader of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. The group’s main leaders lived in exile in Iran during Hussein’s reign. According to New York Newsday, the Bush administration tried to bloc Jabr’s appointment.  
 
 
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