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KLMNO THE WORLD Fears grow that Allawi won’t be included


SECTS STILL ROIL IRAQ


Ex-prime minister may not accept council role


BY LEILA FADEL


baghdad — Ayad Allawi had hoped his political coalition’s strong showing in Iraq’s parlia- mentary election would propel himto the job of primeminister. But after more than eight months of acrimonious negotia- tions, the secular Shiite lost his fight — and is now the greatest uncertainty as Shiite incumbent Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki moves forward with forming a new government. In a nation divided along sec-


tarian and ethnic lines, Allawi became a symbol of secularists and the Sunni Arab minority. The possibility that he may not participate leavesmany U.S. offi- cials — who advocated a power- sharing arrangement amongMa- liki, Allawi and others—worried that the government that stands at the end of 2011, when U.S. troops are scheduled to leave, could be seen as illegitimate, worsening an already fragile se- curity situation. Allawi’s Iraqiya bloc won 91


seats in the March 7 vote, two more than Maliki’s State of Law bloc but not enough to claim majority support in the 325- member parliament. “Maliki knows very well that


without me personally in this process it will be very hard for regional and democracy-loving countries to buy in,” Allawi said as he ate lunch at his kitchen table one recent afternoon. “If he doesn’t accept real power shar- ing, we have to say goodbye to democracy forever and we have to think about other means, peaceful means, to alter deci- sions.” Allawi’s family is in London,


and his home in western Bagh- dad is largely empty, save for the Filipina maids who take care of the cooking and cleaning. Blast walls surround the area and military Humvees are parked outside; he has received death threats and warnings from U.S. officials that someone might try to kill him, his aides said. A poll conducted over the


summer by the International Re- publican Institute, a nonprofit organization funded by the U.S. government, showed that 56 per- cent of the nation would not see the Iraqi government as fully legitimate if Allawi did not par-


ticipate. Only 31 percent thought it would be “legitimate” or “somewhat legitimate,” accord- ing to the poll. A poll by the National Democratic Institute, another U.S. nonprofit, showed that Allawi had more appeal across political lines thanMaliki and other leading politicians. “We’re very, very interested in


all of the key major players here having important roles,”U.S. am- bassador to Iraq James F. Jeffrey told reporters at a briefing last month. “Ayad is one of the more important ones based upon our work with him and based upon his electoral success.”


Strongman reputation Allawi, prime minister during


Iraq’s interim government in 2004 and 2005, became a symbol of change in the lead-up to this year’s vote. Sunni Arabs who felt marginalized by the process hoped he would end religious Shiite majority rule. Secular Iraqis hoped he would break years of sectarian politics that have plagued themsince the U.S. invasion in 2003. But Allawi also unwittingly


became a symbol of the return of SaddamHussein’s outlawed Sun-


ni Arab Baath party, despite breaking ranks with Hussein more than 30 years ago and working against the brutal dicta- tor for decades. Although Allawi was favored


by U.S. officials, they grasped early on that his Shiite rivals would not accept him as prime minister.Neighboring Iran advo- cated heavily for Shiite unity and threw its weight behind Maliki, whom the United States also tacitly backed. Allawi’s party was largely Sunni-backed and includ- ed controversial Sunni leaders in a country where the Shiite ma- jority and Kurdish minority re- main frightened of the outlawed Baath party’s return. “Almost all of the Shiites view


Iraqiya as a Sunni bloc,” said Sami al-Askari, a Shiite legislator close to Maliki. “The feeling in the Shiite community is they are not ready yet to have a Sunni bloc forming this government.” Allawi, much like Maliki, is


seen as amanwith authoritarian tendencies. But he was also seen as an American puppet when he was prime minister. During that time, he supported harsh U.S. military offensives in Shiite Arab Najaf and Sunni Fallujah.He also


“Always Ayad doesn’t accept anything but position number one, and if he cannot get this position, he’s disappointed and turns his back.”


KHALID MOHAMMED/ASSOCIATED PRESS Ayad Allawi says it will be hard for Iraqi leaders to seem legitimate.


—Qassim Dawoud, a former state minister in Allawi’s government


IMF: E.U. needs a bigger cushion


Group will urge nations in euro zone to shore up bailout fund


BY JAN STRUPCZEWSKI AND NOAH BARKIN


The International Monetary


Fund on Monday will urge euro- zone governments to boost the size of their rescue fund and recommend that the European Central Bank buy more bonds to prevent the bloc’s debt crisis from derailing economic recovery. According to a report IMF


AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE VIA GETTY IMAGES Ayouth walks amid the rubble of a rest house in Baghdad popular with Iranian religious tourists.Ablast killed five Iranians the day before.


was rumored to have killed six suspected insurgents with his own hands — a rumor that has been denied by aides but never by Allawi himself. “He is seen as a symbol of the


disenfranchised groups. They saw him as their best vehicle to power,” said a senior U.S. mili- tary officer who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media. “But he is also from the egocentric, strongman mod- el. He won’t be a great leader either, but he brings together the secularists.”


‘Advisory’ position open Allawi has been promised a


position on a yet-to-be-formed Higher Council forNational Poli- cies whose powers are unclear. Before he agrees to take part, he said, he wants to be sure the council has the ability to guide important decisions on defense, the economy and national recon- ciliation, and to check the prime minister’s powers. Parliament is supposed to vote


on legislation on the nature of the job beforeMaliki presents his cabinet for approval nextmonth, Allawi said. “If they don’t come upwith the


proper agreement on the council, me and most of Iraqiya will not participate in this fake govern- ment,” Allawi said. “If I was Maliki after we have given this concession [of primeminister], I would really welcome himrecip- rocating and trying to open a new chapter, a positive one and to work with others.” But State of Law officials call


the council an “advisory” posi- tion and say they don’t expect it to havemuch power. Some observers say Allawi


squandered his opportunity by traveling frequently during the long negotiating process to visit his family and to meet with officials in neighboring coun- tries, trips he said were neces-


DIGEST TURKEY


Israel apology sought over killings on ship Turkey still expects Israel to


apologize and “clean the blood” spilled when nine Turkish activ- istswerekilledbyIsraelicomman- dos on a Gaza-bound ship, its primeminister saidSunday. Prime Minister Tayyip Erdo-


gan’s made the comments as se- nior Foreign Ministry officials from both countries met in Swit- zerland to discuss ways of repair- ing the relationship. Israeli Prime Minister Bin-


yamin Netanyahu telephoned Er- dogan on Friday to thank himfor sendingfirefightingplanes tohelp battle forest fires innorthernIsra- el that killed41people. Itwas the first conversation be-


tween the two men since Israeli soldiersstormedtheMaviMarma- ra on May 31. The boat that was partofaTurkish-ledconvoybring- ingsupplies totheblockadedGaza Strip. Relations between the once close allieshave beentense since. On Friday,Netanyahu said Tur- key’s gesture was an opportunity


to improve ties. But Erdogan said the help fighting the fires was purelyhumanitarian. “No one can expect us to be


silent, to abandonjusticeuntil the blood spilled in the Mediterra- nean is cleaned,” Erdogan said in comments broadcast live by CNN Turk. Israeli officials have said they willnot apologize.


—Reuters AFGHANISTAN


Suicide bomber kills 4, injures at least 18 A suicide bomber blew himself


up next to a collection of shop stalls inside an eastern Afghan army base on Sunday, killing two NATO service members and at least two civilians, officials said. The Taliban claimed responsi-


bility, saying it was an attack by a Taliban sleeper agent who had joined theAfghan army so that he wouldbe able to kill foreigners. The explosion occurred in an


area of the Gardez army base where shopkeepers sell goods to both Afghan soldiers as well as


theirpartneredNATOtroops, said Rohullah Samon, a spokesman for the Paktia provincial govern- ment. NATO said in a statement that


twomembersof themilitary coali- tion died in the suicide attack. They did not identify the victims or give their nationalities.Most of the NATO forces in Gardez are American. Two shopkeepers were killed


andat least 18peoplewerewound- ed in the blast, Samon said. He said he did not have information onanymilitarydeaths. ATaliban spokesman said in an


e-mail sent to media outlets that the civilianswhowere killedwere not innocent because they had collaborated with government andNATOforces. In southern Afghanistan, an-


other NATO service member was killed inaninsurgent attackwhile an Afghan employee of an Ameri- can contractorwas also shot dead inthecityofLashkarGah,officials said. NATO did not provide other


details on the dead service mem- ber.


—AssociatedPress GUILLERMO ARIAS/ASSOCIATED PRESS


Haitians attend aMass at the site where a cathedral stood before being destroyed by the Jan. 12 earthquake in Port-au-Prince. The body of the capital’s archbishop, SergeMiot, had been found in the rubble of his office after the quake.


RUSSIA


Satellites crash after failed launch Three Russian satellites


crashed into the Pacific Ocean on Sunday after a failed launch, in a


setback to a Kremlin project de- signedas a rival tothewidelyused U.S. Global Positioning System navigationtechnology. Russian news agencies said the


satellites veered off course and crashednearHawaiiafterblasting off from Russia’s Baikonur space


center inKazakhstan. The Khrunichev Space Center


said the satellites had failed to enter the right orbit after the launch went wrong 10 minutes after takeoff. In a separate statement, space


agency Roscosmos said that, “ac- cording to the results of our tele- metric analysis, it has been deter- mined that the group of satellites went off orbit.” The satellites were the last of a


batch of 24 at the heart ofRussia’s Glonass,orGlobalNavigationSys- tem, its answer toGPS. The statehas spent$2billionin


the last 10 years on the project, being developed by oil-to-tele- comsholding company Sistema.


Oil cleanup underway in Jamaica: Efforts are underway to clean up an oil spill in the harbor of Jamai- ca’s capital. The island’s emergen- cy management agency says the slick in Kingston Harbor is be- tween an oil refinery and a power station.Authoritiesareinvestigat- ing a Nov. 22 spill in the capital’s harbor, the seventh-largest natu- ralharbor intheworld.


—Reuters


sary for Iraq’s international rela- tionships. Allawi’s political bloc, which


included five major parties, was fractured, its members often looking out for their own inter- ests. Just before they made an agreement to supportMaliki last month, Iraqiya officials said Al- lawi agreed to the deal to stop his political bloc from crumbling beneath him. “Unfortunately, this is the


style of Ayad,” said Qassim Da- woud, a former state minister in Allawi’s government. “Always Ayad doesn’t accept anything but position number one, and if he cannot get this position, he’s disappointed and turns his back.”


‘Iraqiya is welcome’ With or without Allawi, in-


cumbent Maliki has promised to put together a government by mid-December. Maliki’s backers believe they can offer important positions to the rest of Allawi’s coalition and garner the backing Maliki needs in parliament. “If someone fromIraqiya does


not want to join, this person will not stop the process of forming the government,” Maliki said re- cently. “The participation of all Iraqiya is welcome.” Allawi warned that, if he de-


cided not to join the government, he would remain in Iraq and work from within parliament to oppose Maliki’s government “peacefully.” “Not to draw parallels, but I


opposed Saddamonmy own and when I opposed him we were only five people in the hierarchy of the Baath party,” Allawi said. “Being an extreme minority nev- er frightened me off. . . . Even if I’m left out, I wouldn’t feel isolated. I know the sympathies of the people are with me and Iraqiya.”


fadell@washpost.com


chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn will present to euro-zone finance ministers at a meeting in Brus- sels, the turmoil hitting countries in the currency area’s southern periphery constitutes a “severe downside risk” and more action from member states is needed. Together with the IMF, the European Union set up a rescue facility of 750 billion euros ($1 trillion) in May, but it now faces pressure to increase the amount after last week’s rescue of Ireland failed to ease fears of contagion to Portugal, Spain and other high-deficit countries. The IMF report, a copy of


which was obtained by Reuters, says there is a “strong case for increasing the resources avail- able for this safety net and mak- ing their use more flexible, in- cluding for the purpose of provid- ing more effective support to banking systems.” The report also says extraordi-


nary measures by the European Central Bank tocombat the crisis, including its bond-purchasing program, should be expanded un- til systemic uncertainties recede. Governmentdebt purchases by


the central bank calmed markets toward the end of last week, pushing down the borrowing costs of vulnerable countries on the euro zone’s southern periph- ery.


But Jean-Claude Trichet, presi-


dent of the European Central Bank, has made it clear that Eu- rope’s politicians should not count on the central bank alone to solve the bloc’s woes and urged themto take decisive newsteps to prevent contagion. Belgian FinanceMinister Didi-


erReynders, speaking at a confer- ence in Brussels on Saturday, echoed theIMFin urging his euro partners to think about boosting the rescue facility, which would be stretched ifPortugalandSpain required bailouts. In a bid to ease market con-


cerns about Spanish finances, the government of Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero un- veiled new measures last week, saying it would bring forward pension reforms, raise tobacco taxes and cut subsidies for wind power. Its plans to sell off a 49 percent


stake in the state-owned airports authority provoked a 24-hour strike by air traffic controllers that paralyzed airports and forced the government to declare a state of emergency.


—Reuters


MONDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2010


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