Word: sectarianism
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...risky strategy. Some Iraqis say a strongman is just what they need to end Iraq's destructive sectarian politics. But at the polls, Iraqis have shown little appetite for tough guys, preferring to vote for diffuse coalitions of parties with little in common beyond sectarian identity. The cautionary tale for Maliki is Iyad Allawi, the country's first post-Saddam Prime Minister: he, too, portrayed himself as a strongman, but his secular coalition won barely 14% of the vote. "Maliki will go the same way as Allawi," says Abdel-Bari al-Zebari, a Kurdish MP. "Iraqis know that a strongman...
...everyone in Iraq is eager to speed things up. Crocker and senior U.S. military officials in Iraq have repeatedly warned that reducing troops too quickly risks renewing sectarian violence, which has fallen to its lowest levels since the U.S. invasion in 2003. The ambassador stressed the point again, saying insurgent forces in Iraq remained deadly and poised to reassert themselves. Moreover, Crocker said, a hasty departure of U.S. forces might deepen doubt among Iraqis, who tend to see the current security gains as fragile. "I think it would have a chilling effect on Iraqis," Crocker said...
...scores of Sadrists with the help of U.S. troops, effectively hollowing out the movement's street power and political influence. Meanwhile, the vast popularity that al-Sadr's movement once enjoyed among Iraq's Shi'ites seems to have declined too as Iraqis appear to grow increasingly weary of sectarian politics. A recent poll published by the National Media Center, which is funded by the Iraqi government, said 42% of Iraqis hoped to see secular candidates win in the coming provincial elections (31% said they wanted candidates from religious parties to take seats...
...After choosing to leave the Senate the following year, he became an envoy tasked with tackling sectarian violence in Northern Island. As chairman of the peace negotiations, he helped broker negotiations that culminated in the historic Good Friday agreement. In 1998, Mitchell earned an honorary knighthood for his role in fostering the peace...
Still, candidates for the Iraqi National Accord, Iraq's second largest secular party after the Kurdish bloc, say they see a window of opportunity. As Iraq moves toward its first round of nationwide elections in nearly four years, a complex political map of new parties and fluid, cross-sectarian alliances suggest that the country may be slowly moving beyond the Shi'ite-Sunni divide that characterized the post-Saddam Hussein politics of previous years...