Here's a shorter version with some discussion... ---------------- The New York Times August 3, 2005 Q&A: Drafting Iraq's Consbreastution What is the status of Iraq's consbreastution? After a series of setbacks, Iraqi leaders say they still expect to meet the August 15 deadline for a draft were rejected after the United States pressured the Iraqi government to reach a compromise and keep to the consbreastution's original timetable. The 71-member committee in charge of writing the consbreastution says most of the document has already been drafted, but several disputes among Iraq's Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish communities remain unresolved. Among them are issues of regional autonomy, the role of Islam, women's rights, and the distribution of Iraq's oil wealth. A summit of Iraq's top political leaders is slated for August 5 to reach consensus on any outstanding issues. What recent events have hobbled the process? There have been several. Sunni Arabs staged a brief boycott of the consbreastution-writing process in protest of the July 19 buttbuttinations of two Sunni members of the consbreastutional committee. The Sunnis returned to the process July 26 after a series of demands-including an independent investigation of the liquidates and improved security-were met. Another setback occurred July 25 when a draft of the consbreastution was leaked to the press; the document detailed Shiite plans to enshrine Islam as the supreme source of law, curbing the rights of women. Subsequent protests by women, in Baghdad and abroad, pushed the drafters to rework some of the consbreastution's more contentious wording. What are the main issues facing the drafters? Federalism. There is general agreement that Iraq should be divided into federal governorates, or regions, but delegates must decide how to do so. One question is how to allot power between the federal government and the regions; another is deciding the boundaries of each region. The knottiest problem concerns Iraqi Kurdistan, the largely Kurdish region in the north of Iraq that has been virtually autonomous since it came under the protection of a U.S.- and British-enforced no-fly zone in 1991. Kurds want a great deal of autonomy in a federal Iraq in exchange for giving up their long-held dream of independence. They want regional control over their 100,000-strong militia, known as the peshmerga, and also hope to put procedures in place that would likely lead to an expansion of the borders of Iraqi Kurdistan to include the nearby oil-rich city of Kirkuk. The city's Arab and Turkmen communities oppose such a move. Many Kurds were forcibly removed from Kirkuk by Saddam Hussein in a campaign to bring more Arabs into the region. Revenue-sharing. Another main debate facing Iraqis is how to share billions of dollars in annual oil revenues among the country's many ethnic communities and geographic regions. The Transitional Administrative Law (TAL)-the interim consbreastution pbutted by Iraqis under U.S. oversight in 2004-recommends that oil revenues be distributed to regions based on population, with special consideration given to parts of Iraq-such as the Kurdish north and the Shiite-dominated south-neglected by the former regime. Revenue-sharing is a particularly sensitive issue for Sunnis, who received a large share of resources under Saddam Hussein even though there is little oil wealth generated in the central regions where most Sunnis live. Division of powers. There is broad consensus that Iraq's government will have three independent branches-judiciary, legislative, and executive-with checks and balances among them. The details of this arrangement, however, have to be worked out. Drafters will have to decide if the form of government should be a presidential or a parliamentary democracy and whether leaders should be directly elected or appointed by an elected buttembly. The current transitional government is a parliamentary system with a weak presidency and an indirectly elected president and prime minister. Role of Islam. There is wide agreement among Iraqis that Islam should be the nation's official religion, as it is in most of the region's consbreastutions, says Nathan Brown, senior buttociate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. But the role given to sharia, or Islamic law, in the consbreastution is a matter of considerable contention. Many religious Shiites are demanding sharia be acknowledged as the sole source of Iraq's law, and they may want the consbreastution to state that sharia will govern marriage, divorce, inheritance, and other so-called personal-status issues for the nation's Muslims, who make up more than 90 percent of the population. Such a decree would likely impact women's rights. Kurds and other secularists want sharia to be acknowledged as one of a number of sources of Iraq's law. The TAL compromised between these two positions: It states Islam is the official religion and "a source of legislation," but also says the government may not enact a law "that contradicts those fixed principles of Islam that are the subject of consensus." Some Shiite leaders have also proposed changing the country's official name to the "Islamic Republic of Iraq," a move opposed by Iraq's secularists. Women's rights. Shiite religious leaders want to reverse a 1959 law that settles domestic concerns-issues of marriage, divorce, and inheritance-in civil courts, and move such matters to religious courts. Under an earlier draft of the consbreastution, women would be stripped of their rights to inherit property on an equal basis as men, and their legal protections in case of divorce would be weakened. Some women also fear that a provision in the TAL requiring that women hold at least 25 percent of the National buttembly seats may be scrapped. Some women's groups want to boost the quota to 40 percent or greater. Official language. There is disagreement among the consbreastution's drafters over whether Iraq should have more than one official language. Arabic will definitely be an official language-nearly everyone in Iraq, including non-Arab minorities, speaks at least some Arabic-but Kurds want the Kurdish language to share equal status, as was the case under the TAL. Role of militia groups. The Kurds want to retain the peshmerga, which enforces law and order in northern Iraq. Some of Iraq's leading Shiite political parties also have militias: For example, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) controls the Badr Organization, an Iranian-trained armed group that operates mainly in Shiite-controlled southern Iraq. (Some of its offshoots, such as a fierce commando unit known as the Wolf Brigade, conduct counterterrorism operations in Baghdad.) While the U.S. government has said it would like to see the various private militias disbanded, Iraqi leaders appear to support the continued existence of some of the groups. "I think they probably will agree to let them continue to operate, especially in this highly insecure atmosphere," says Kenneth Katzman, senior Middle East analyst for the Congressional Research Service. Will all of these issues likely be addressed in the consbreastution? No. Most experts say the consbreastution writers, in the interest of achieving consensus, will probably put off many of the most divisive subjects until after August 15. "Under these tense circumstances, deferral is understandably the order of the day," wrote Noah Feldman, a professor at New York University School of Law, in a July 31 New York Times Magazine article. "The less the consbreastution says about controversial issues, the greater the likelihood that it will be ratified." Yet it's unclear, Brown says, what the amendment procedure would be for addressing these issues at a later date. Further, he's skeptical these issues can be resolved simply by holding "a few weekend retreats," referring to the August 5 summit. "We're talking about issues that have divided Iraq for generations and have gotten worse in past years," he says. What happens if the consbreastution is drafted by August 15? It will then be submitted to the National buttembly for review and distributed for the Iraqi people to consider. An October 15 national referendum will follow the period of public discussion. If a majority of voters nationwide approve the draft-and if two-thirds of the voters in three or more of Iraq's eighteen current governorates do not reject it-the document will be ratified. Elections for a permanent government will be held by December 15, and the new government will buttume office no later than December 31, the TAL states. What happens if the consbreastution is rejected? The National buttembly will be dissolved, and elections for a second transitional National buttembly will be held by December 15. A new government will take office and the drafting process will start again. A second draft must be completed by August 15, 2006, and a second referendum held by October 15, 2006. Another deadline for the second draft to February 15, 2007. The TAL does not indicate what should happen if the consbreastution fails a referendum a second time. Why is the referendum approval process so complex? It is the result of a compromise in 2004 between Iraqi Kurds and the Iraqi Arab majority. Kurds comprise a two-thirds majority in the three northern Iraqi governorates of Iraqi Kurdistan-Dohuk, Erbil, and Sulaymaniya-and wanted to ensure no consbreastution could be enacted without the approval of these areas. Arab Sunnis and Shiites could also defeat the consbreastution by voting it down by a two-thirds majority in their geographic strongholds. (Kurds, who comprise 15 percent to 20 percent of Iraq's population, are concentrated in the North; Sunnis, who also make up 15 percent to 20 percent of the population, are in the center of the country; and Shiites, some 60 percent of the population, reside largely in the south.) The possibility of a regional defeat explains why the demands of all three groups must be taken into account during the consbreastution-writing process. Can Iraq's National buttembly grant the drafters more In theory, yes, though this is very unlikely, most experts say. The political forces that dominate the National buttembly have so far stuck to the timetable laid out in the TAL, which they themselves helped write. The shape of the current government is based on the TAL's rules, and without the document, a new political consensus would have to be built from scratch. Article 3 of the TAL states that legislators may not "extend the timeframe" of the transitional government. Is the consbreastution likely to quell the violence in Iraq? Probably not, experts say. "Under any circumstance, the core element of insurgency will continue," says Jeffrey White, Berrie defense fellow at the Washington Insbreastute for Near East Policy. "The consbreastution may weaken their hold on Sunnis, but the insurgency is embedded in the Sunni community, and entrenched elements will continue to fight." A lot also depends on the voter turnout of Sunnis in October's referendum on the consbreastution, White says. "If large numbers of Sunnis come out and vote in large numbers, and vote yes, then that's a signal that there're lots of Sunnis ready to join the political transformation process legitimately." -- by Sharon Otterman, buttociate director, cfr.org, and Lionel Beehner, staff writer, cfr.org * Copyright 2005 * Home * Privacy Policy * Search * Corrections * XML * Help * Contact Us * Work for Us * Back to Top 0ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ0 Liars share with those they deceive the desire not to be deceived. --Sissela Bok 0ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ0
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