Word: sunniness
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Anbar province was once one of the most violent and volatile regions of Iraq, accounting for hundreds of U.S. casualties. On Monday, however, the province - quieted by the U.S. military in alliance with Sunni tribal sheiks, the so-called Sunni Awakening or Sahwa movement - was turned back to Iraqi government rule...
...decision had already been made by the government and we cannot change it," says Sheikh Mohammad Mahmood al Natah, the spokesperson for the Awakening Council. The hand-over, originally scheduled for June, took place on Monday, making Anbar the 11th of Iraq's 18 provinces, and the first Sunni region, to return to the central government's control. It's a measure of the growing security gains in the war-scarred country, but simmering intra-Sunni tensions in Anbar are bubbling...
Only a handful of the 40 or so Awakening leaders attended the ceremony in Ramadi, a snub that Sheikh Natah says was intended as a clear message to the government. At heart is a power struggle between the Awakening council and the Iraqi Islamic Party, made up of Sunni exiles who are allied with the Shi'ite prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki. The party holds 36 of the Anbar council's 41 seats. Those posts are up for grabs if a slow-moving electoral law is approved by Iraq's bickering parliamentarians and the provincial elections that were slated...
Unlike the last time around in 2005, the Sunni tribal elders are eager to contest the polls, and say they wanted U.S. troops to remain in Anbar until after the elections to help ensure a free and fair ballot. They also want their key ally, police chief Major General Tareq Youssef al A'sal al Dulaimi, reinstated to the position he was ousted from just a few days ago. (Dulaimi was removed for unspecified "administrative" reasons.) The Awakening members say Dulaimi's sudden removal, which was approved by the Interior Ministry, has cemented their fears that their local Sunni rivals...
They say Dulaimi's replacement, Riad al Karboole (who will his assume his duties after the hand-over) is an Islamic Party man, and they fear the police force will be infiltrated by their extremist Sunni enemies. "If the Islamic Party continues to pressure the government to remove the Awakening members from the security forces ... then there is a high likelihood that Anbar will return to violence," Sheikh Natah says...