Word: baghdad
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...final composition of the government will nominally affect the future direction of the Iraqi state - whether it becomes more centralized in the hands of the Baghdad government, or whether power is devolved to the regions, especially the Shi'ite-dominated south and the Kurdish north. But either direction could destabilize the country. Devolution could spark a civil war between Arabs and Kurds, while further centralization in a country with a history of totalitarianism could put Iraq on a slippery slope to a new kind of dictatorship...
...measure of how much safer Iraq is these days that some 6,000 people jammed Baghdad's basketball stadium last week to attend a public rally for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Two years ago, at the height of Iraq's sectarian civil war, no one would have dared show up, but this warm-up for the March 7 election was a surprisingly relaxed event. The rings of police around the stadium didn't bother to check for car bombs and gave only one brief pat-down for weapons at the entrance. Inside, al-Maliki, though the head...
...however, such fears have been misplaced. One of the largest Sunni parties, even after its leader had been banned by the de-Baathification committee, rescinded its call for a boycott. Most Sunnis have learned the hard way that money, security, jobs and power come from Baghdad, and they now want their leaders to play the game, even if its rules are less favorable. (See pictures of President Obama in Iraq...
...Perhaps the biggest possible source of new instability, however, is the unresolved dispute between Kurds and Arabs over Kurdish-populated areas in northern Iraq that remain under the nominal authority of the Baghdad government - none more so than the oil-rich city of Kirkuk. Arabs in Baghdad accuse the Kurds of illegally pumping oil and preparing to declare independence, while the Kurds suspect that the next Arab Prime Minister might try to consolidate power in Arab Iraq by taking a hard line against Kurdish separatism...
...have the title in your head the whole time? Pretty early on. It's something I heard in Baghdad a couple of times, and it stuck with me, that phrase, the hurt locker. It means the place of ultimate pain - a painful place...