Ex IRA Boss, UVF Killer Bring Iraq-Namese Shi’ites and Sunnis Together
While the American media covered President Bush’s pre-Petraeus Report trip to American-held Iraq-Nam, a rather odd four-day conference in Finland came up with a 12-point plan for peace in Mesopotamia. Sunnis and Shi’ites agreed to further talks, and most notable among the western attendees were ex-IRA boss Martin McGuinness and hunger striker Leo Green along with Billy Hutchinson, a former senior member of the Ulster Volunteer Force who served a lengthy prison sentence for murder, and Democratic Unionist politico Jeffrey Donaldson. If politics makes strange bedfellows, diplomacy goes even further.
Under the auspices of the John W. McCormack graduate school of policy studies at the University of Massachusetts in Boston, 16 delegates from feuding Iraq-Namese groups met in Finland over the last few days. They included representatives of the radical Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr; the leader of the largest Sunni Arab political group, Adnan al-Dulaimi; and Humam Hammoudi, the Shi’ite chairman of the Iraq-Namese parliament’s foreign affairs committee. Whether they can commit their respective constituencies to a settlement is hard to say, but they did get some pointers from the South Africans sent by Nelson Mandela and the Northern Irish – both of whom have managed to settle differences as big as those in Iraq-Nam.
The 12-point framework agreed to in Finland is fairly nebulous, but the fact is that there is a framework in place and that talks can continue long after the American military’s surge has passed into the history books (most likely as a footnote). They agreed to:
- Resolve political issues through non-violence and democracy.
- Prohibit use of arms while in talks.
- Form independent commission to disarm groups in verifiable manner.
- Accept results of negotiations.
- End international interference.
- Commit to protect human rights.
- Assure independence and effectiveness of the law and courts, especially constitutional court.
- Full participation of all parties in political process and governance.
- Take all steps to end violence, killings, forced displacement and damage to infrastructure.
- Establish independent body to explore how to deal with the past in way which will unite nation.
- Support efforts to make political process successful and to protect Iraq's unity and sovereignty.
- Participating groups commit to principles as complete set of rules.
And American media missed it entirely. The Kensington Review challenges readers to find a single report of this meeting in the American media dated prior to September 5.
© Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.
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