Word: iraq
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...political conflicts, those political conflicts are threatening to become even more complicated. Besides the Arab-Kurd and Sunni-Shi'ite divides, there has long been a struggle among rival political parties for supremacy among the Shi'ites. Shi'ite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki recently called for amendments to Iraq's constitution to strengthen the central government's power at the expense of the country's 18 provinces. This week, Maliki's rivals in the southern Shi'ite bastion of Basra submitted a petition demanding a referendum in the oil-soaked province aimed to turning it into a semi-autonomous...
...more expansive than just Basra, and whose concern would obviously be to create a political entity in which it could rule - is sitting on the fence in response to the Basra autonomy proposal, the Sadrists are furious. "It's playing with fire that could engulf all of Iraq," says Sheikh Salah al-Obeidi, a spokesman for Sadr's movement in the southern Shi'ite holy city of Najaf. "The result might be the division of Iraq if it's forced now, during this period...
...Sunnis, who ruled dominated Iraq under Saddam Hussein, are also hostile, having already had to confront the unpalatable prospect of the country's northern oil fields falling under the control of the Kurdish region. "This will create many problems over water rights, the delineation of borders, oil fields, mineral resources, this all needs to be considered," says Hashem al-Ta'ie, head of parliament's regional and provincial committee and a member of the largest Sunni parliamentary bloc. "Look at the problems between the Kurdistan Regional Government and the central government...
...longer the foundation for creating a state. Let the people of Basra decide." The people of Basra, of course, will likely present different views on the matter, at the urging of rival political parties. And the resulting tension may yet present new security challenges in Iraq...
After months of thorny back-and-forth negotiations, several revisions and much hand-wringing, the Iraqi Cabinet on Sunday finally approved the contentious Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), which provides a legal basis for U.S. military operations to continue in Iraq after Dec. 31, when the U.N. mandate expires. But it's too early to pop the champagne. The bilateral U.S.-Iraqi security pact is by no means a done deal: it must still be ratified by a fractured parliament. The Cabinet vote had only one nay to 27 ayes, but nine Cabinet members chose to withdraw from the final...