IRAQI COUNCIL SHIITES WALK OUT OF SESSION ON CONSTITUTION

Role of Islamic Law Causes Rift With Sunnis

 Artículo de Rajiv Chandrasekaran  en “The Washington Post” del 28/02/2004

 BAGHDAD, Feb. 27 -- Shiite Muslim members of Iraq's Governing Council walked out of a session to draft an interim constitution on Friday after a dispute over women's rights, exposing deep divisions between the country's two principal religious groups as they seek to form a transitional government.

The walkout by eight of the council's 13 Shiite members, the first since the body was formed in July, casts doubt on the council's ability to meet a Saturday deadline set by the Bush administration for drafting an interim constitution. Several members and their aides said the protest provided the clearest indication yet of the political gulf between majority Shiites, who largely favor a greater role for Islamic law, and minority Sunnis, who prefer a more secular system.

The disagreement stemmed from a decision to vote on a resolution introduced by some Shiites that would have imposed sharia, or Islamic law, in adjudicating divorces, inheritances and other family matters. When the resolution was rejected by Sunni members and a few liberal Shiites, two dozen women who had been invited into the council chamber erupted into applause, prompting the eight Shiite members to leave.

"They didn't like it," said council member Mahmoud Othman, a Sunni Kurd. "The women were cheering, so they got upset and they walked out."

The departure deprived the 25-member council of a quorum and halted work on the drafting of the interim constitution, which was scheduled to begin after the vote. Although it was viewed by some in the chamber as political theater, the walkout was the latest in a series of tense disagreements between Shiites and Sunnis about the shape of Iraq's interim government.

Several Shiite members have renewed their insistence in recent days that Islamic law be the sole source of legislation, instead of one source among many, as Sunnis and the Bush administration favor. If Islam were to become the sole basis of legislation, some religious moderates fear it could mean the loss of long-standing women's rights and the introduction of such punishments as cutting off a thief's hand.

After years of subjugation under former president Saddam Hussein, Shiite members also want to ensure that they retain clear control of the transitional government, which would take over after the U.S. civilian occupation ends on June 30. They have insisted that the interim constitution include a provision stating that if the transitional assembly cannot agree on one president -- presumably a Shiite -- then there must be five presidents, three of whom must be Shiites.

"The Shiites want to make sure they are in control," said Ghazi Yawar, a Sunni council member. "Because they consider themselves a majority, they want things their way."

Sunni politicians said they were surprised by the walkout. "It's absurd and unnecessary at this critical juncture," said a top aide to a Sunni council member, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "This is a period where we need to be showing unity and coming to decisions on critical matters. An act of petulance will not serve the people's interest."

The Shiite members who staged the walkout could not be reached for comment on Friday. They held meetings late into the night at the residence of council member Ahmed Chalabi, a moderate Shiite who has allied himself with Shiite conservatives in recent weeks in an apparent attempt to build political support.

Sunni members said a meeting between both sides had been scheduled for Saturday morning. They said they would attempt to resume negotiations over the interim constitution but expressed doubt that the document would be completed by the end of the day.

Arab and Kurdish Sunni leaders said they were unwilling to bend on the issue of Islamic law. The U.S. administrator of Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, has also indicated that he will veto any interim constitution that makes Islam the sole source of legislation.

"It is very difficult to imagine that we will finish it in a day," Othman said. "There are many things left for us to resolve."

Othman said U.S. officials had urged council members to try to reach agreement on most, if not all, issues on Saturday, so they can announce that they have met the Bush administration's Feb. 28 deadline for completing the document. "They're pushing us to declare something," he said. "They told us we can resolve other issues later on."

Sticking to the Saturday deadline has been a priority for Bremer. The date, along with the planned June 30 handover of sovereignty, is among the few milestones the Bush administration hopes to preserve from an earlier plan for the political transition that has been largely abandoned. Daniel Senor, a spokesman for Bremer, said the U.S. occupation authority remained optimistic that Shiites and Sunnis would reach agreement on the interim constitution, also known as the transitional administrative law. "There were ups and downs," he said. "This is to be expected in any negotiations. But based on the discussions the Governing Council has had with us, we believe that they are making progress on finalizing the transitional administrative law."

After the Shiites walked out, the Sunnis continued to meet unofficially.

One issue that will not be spelled out in the interim constitution is what sort of transitional government Iraq will have when the U.S. civil occupation ends. With the Bush administration scrapping its plan for regional caucuses, U.S. officials and Iraqi leaders must decide what sort of administration will rule the country until elections can be held in several months. That system will be described in an addendum to the interim constitution, council members said.

For now, Kurdish leaders appear to be allied with Sunni Arabs, a group with whom they have had intense disagreements about the future of Kurdish pesh merga militia, the division of Iraq's oil revenue and the status of former Kurdish territory that had been annexed to Arab-dominated provinces by Hussein.

Kurdish leaders want the pesh merga to become an official national guard force in a Kurdish autonomous region, but Bremer and Sunni leaders want the central government to have greater control over the militia. Arab and Kurd politicians said that issue and others relating to Kurdish autonomy are scheduled to be discussed on Saturday, which could result in a split between the Sunni Arabs and Kurds, leaving three separate groups fighting for the drafting pen.