Middle East Focus-Arabia Deserta: Allawi Ally Injects Sectarianism into Iraq Race………………

Arabia Deserta

Allawi Ally Injects Sectarianism into Iraq Race………………

“But the most strident claims have come from Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, who is a Sunni Arab, and the current president, Jalal Talabani, the Kurdish candidate, whose avuncular nature made him a compromise pick for a post even he, with a self-deprecating smile, called honorary. Mr. Hashimi’s very public ambitions for the job have already ignited a dispute with Kurdish officials, who are eager to retain a pivotal say in politics in Baghdad. Fuad Hussein, the chief of staff to Massoud Barzani, the president of the semiautonomous Kurdish region, called the notion “insulting for the Kurdish people, as if the Kurds cannot produce a president in this country or cannot be president in this country.” A statement from Mr. Barzani’s office last week went further, saying the idea that the next president must be a Sunni Arab rekindled beliefs of “chauvinism and ethnic superiority” that were redolent of the days of President Saddam Hussein…….”

Oddly, there are more Kurds in Iraq than Sunni Arabs. It is this sense of entitlement that comes to a small minority from being handed the country by the British some ninety years ago. It takes time for the new reality in Iraq to sink in.
Cheers
mhg

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