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December 06, 2004

United Iraqi Alliance

Expect to hear that name more often:

Iraq News, BAGHDAD - Iraq's main Shi'ite political parties, backed by one of the country's largest Sunni Arab tribes as well as Kurds and Turkmen, have sealed an alliance to stand in next month's elections.

A list of candidates, called the United Iraqi Alliance, has been approved by Iraq's most influential Shi'ite cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, but he was not involved in its selection, a member of the committee that drew up the list said.

"This is an historic moment," Hussain al-Shahristani, a former nuclear scientist imprisoned by Saddam Hussein and once tipped to become Iraq's interim prime minister, told Reuters on Monday. "This is the birth of a new, democratic and just Iraq."

Documents legalising the list, comprising about 20 political groups, movements and parties, are expected to be signed on Monday and it should be presented to Iraq's Independent Electoral Commission on Tuesday, Shahristani said.

The two main parties on the slate are the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) and Dawa, which has splintered since the fall of Saddam but both of whose main branches are signed on to the list.

It also includes the Iraqi National Congress, headed by former U.S. ally Ahmad Chalabi, the National Democratic Party, and the chief of the Shamar, one of Iraq's most powerful Sunni Arab tribes, headed by the uncle of Iraq's interim president.

The inclusion of the Shamar, who are dominant in northern Iraq, chiefly around the city of Mosul, is of particular importance with Iraq's insurgency, believed to be led by Sunni extremists, showing no sign of letting up.

Iraq's president, Ghazi al-Yawar, has decided to launch his own political party, The Iraqis. It is not clear how many of the Shamar tribe will follow his lead or that of his uncle.

Others signed up include a group from Iraq's Turkish-speaking Turkmen minority and a party representing Shi'ite Kurds. Most Kurds are Sunni Muslims.

Moqtada al-Sadr, the rebellious Shi'ite cleric who has led two uprisings against U.S. forces in southern Iraq this year, will also have representatives on the slate. The cleric himself and his top religious aides are not on it, however.

"It is a truly national alliance, it is not a Shi'ite list," said Shahristani, who will be among the list's top names.

Sistani, an Iranian-born cleric who holds enormous sway among Iraq's 60 percent Shi'ite majority, put together a six-person committee that spent nearly two months negotiating with parties and groups to draw up the alliance.

Shahristani said the cleric, who lives in the holy Iraq city of Najaf, was "very happy with the outcome", but he stressed Sistani had had no veto over the names and groups drafted in.

Posted by Mike at December 6, 2004 11:00 AM

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