Tribal leaders support for reconciliation plan

The second in a series of IRIN stories examining the obstacles Iraq faces in implementing its government’s plan to reconcile different sections of Iraqi society. Click on the following link for an overview of the series: Iraq reconciliation series overview

The Iraqi government’s reconciliation plan to end violence between minority Sunni and majority Shi’ite Muslims gained some momentum in late August when nearly 500 Iraqi tribal leaders signed a pledge to support it.

However, to retain that crucial support, some say Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki must address underlying socio-economic problems that affect millions of Iraqis.

At a conference of tribal leaders in Baghdad on August 26, al-Maliki won endorsement for a programme of bridging religious, ethnic and political divisions. A representative of the tribal chiefs called their agreement to support it, a “pact of honour”.

The signatories included Iraq’s main tribes, particularly from Sunni areas where resistance to the presence of United States forces in Iraq, has been much greater. Tribal chiefs are non-elected leaders from Iraqi clans.

"Because tribal ties wield considerable influence in Iraqi society, especially among rural people for whom clan bonds are still important, support from tribal chiefs was a major boost for al-Maliki,” Khalaf al-Hadithi, a Baghdad-based political analyst with the National Institute for Political Studies.

However, tribal affiliations are sometimes tenuous, so al-Maliki still faces a tough task.

"This doesn't mean that all the country's problems have vanished; this pact is unlikely to bring peace to Iraq," Al-Hadithi said. "In return, they [tribal chiefs], especially the Sunni ones, have problems that they want to be solved such as unemployment, [the release of] detainees and [the end of] raids and military operations in their areas."

"We are in real need of each other," said a sheikh from the Sunni western province of Anbar, who said his tribe consists of about 150,000 people. The sheikh asked not to be named because he feared reprisal from militant groups for cooperating with the government.

"We can secure our areas and help the government, but the government has to be faithful to its words and improve services, review the files of our detainees and release the innocent, and help them to find jobs," the sheikh said.

The reconciliation plan offers an amnesty to those members of the Sunni-led resistance to coalition forces who have not committed crimes against humanity; it also calls for the disarming of militias; and it promises compensation for damage caused by US-led and Iraqi government forces.

None of five major Sunni Arab insurgent groups, represented by the Mujahedin Shura Council, has publicly agreed to join the plan, though unnamed ‘Iraqi armed groups’ have privately agreed.

Sectarian violence

Iraq’s Shi’ite-dominated, unity government is struggling to cope both with sectarian violence and the Sunni Arab insurgency that has followed the toppling of Iraq’s former president Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Tribal chiefs acknowledge that cooperation and leadership are essential to move the country away from sectarian violence.

"Realising the gravity of the situation our country is undergoing, we pledge in front of God and the Iraqi people to be sincere and serious in preserving the unity of our country," read the agreement they signed. They also pledged to "work hard to stop the bloodletting and ... sectarian killings that have nothing to do with our values”.

Al-Maliki has pinned his hopes on the support of tribal chiefs to help draw Iraqis away from violence. "These tribes have to play a significant role in fighting terrorists, saboteurs and infiltrators," he said at the August conference.

However, the Iraqi parliament’s Speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, a Sunni Arab, said he did not expect quick results. "Violence in Iraq will not go down," he said. "It is a complicated case and there are many elements inside and outside Iraq affecting this case, but the meeting is very important. We cannot eliminate the violence completely. But still we are optimistic."

Tribal chiefs themselves come under extreme pressure from insurgents: militants and their allies have launched a campaign to intimidate and murder people helping the Iraqi government and its allies.

Last May, Sheikh Osama Al-Jadaan, the Sunni tribal chief of Karabila tribe in Anbar, was gunned down after he allegedly lent some fighters to help US troops seek out al-Qaeda elements in western Iraq.

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