Iraq’s powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, February 24, 2020. Photo: Screengrab/Al Sharqiya TV/Youtube
Sadr urges Kurdish opposition leader Shaswar Abdulwahid to continue protests against the ruling elite
NAJAF,— Iraq’s Influential Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Monday called on Kurdistan Democratic Party KDP leader Massoud Barzani not to be sympathetic to the US presence in Iraq and for the disbandment of Kurdish Peshmerga militias for the good of Iraq’s national security.
Kurdish leaders, including KDP head and former President of Iraqi Kurdistan Region Massoud Barzani, have argued that Iraq needs the US and the anti-Islamic State (ISIS) coalition it leads in Iraq to fight off the lingering threat posed by the militant group.
“[My message] to brother Massoud [Barzani] is for him not to be sympathetic to the Americans. We benefit him more than them. The [US] occupation has to leave no matter what. Enough with tampering with our potential, division among us,” Sadr said in an interview with Iraqi channel al-Sharqiya.
A long outspoken opponent to US military presence in Iraq, Sadr – currently leader of Iraqi parliament’s largest bloc, the Sayirun Alliance – founded the Mahdi Army to fight against the US occupation in Iraq from 2003 until their disbandment in 2008.
Shaswar Abdulwahid, the leader of the New Generation Movement (Newey Nwê), Sulaimani, Iraqi Kurdistan, 2019. Photo: Abdulwahid’s FB
Sadr called on New Generation (Newey Nwê) President Shaswar Abdulwahid, the main opposition party, to continue supporting anti-corruption demonstrations.
Thousands of Iraqi Kurds on February 22, rallied against poor public services and corruption among the ruling parties in their autonomous region. The rallies led by the New Generation, came amid ongoing protests since October 2019 in Baghdad and Iraq’s south demanding an overhaul of the federal government.
The cleric has become a figurehead of anti-US presence in Iraq following a spike in US-Iran hostilities that culminated in the assassination of top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad last month. A Sadr-sponsored march on January 24 calling for US troop expulsion attracted hundreds of thousands of supporters.
Sadr has insisted on the departure of the approximately 5,200 US troops currently based in Iraq, arguing that US presence is destructive to national security and is causing the country to play host to international battles.
Calls for the expulsion of US troops from Iraq have largely been opposed by Kurdish and Sunni politicians, who boycotted a January 5 parliamentary session that saw Shiite parties pass a non-binding resolution demanding the government kick foreign troops out of the country.
Territories disputed by Baghdad and Erbil have recently seen an uptick in ISIS activity, including killings and kidnappings. But Sadr argued that Iraqis, including the Saraya al-Salam (Peace Brigades) militia he formed in 2014, are capable of handling ISIS without US cover.
Massoud Barzani, KDP party leader, Iraqi Kurdistan, 2018. Photo: PA
“The people all are ready [for ISIS]. The entirety of the blood of Sadrists, including mine, is ready to be spilled for Iraq’s salvation from Daesh,” he said, using the Arabic acronym for ISIS.
But attention ought to turn to the disbandment of Iraq’s militias in order to disrupt sectarian attitudes to security and strengthen the Iraqi Army – a disbandment to start with his Peace Brigades, the cleric said.
“Iraqi Army and Police are guards of the Region. A Shiite protects the Region and a Kurd protects the south. This is how a state should be – not a Kurd protecting Kurds, a Shiite protecting Shiites and a Sunni protecting Sunnis. This is not a state.”
Dismissing its Iraqi Constitution classification as “Regional Guards”, Sadr instead referred to the Peshmerga – the official military force of the Kurdistan Region – as one of the militias that need to be disbanded.
“As long as they [Peshmerga] are not the Army and Police, then they are a militia,” Sadr asserted.
Iraqi Kurdistan is not unified region, it is divided politically and geographically between the KDP led by Massoud Barzani and his family and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan led by the Talabani’s clan.
Kurdish Peshmerga forces in Iraqi Kurdistan are not unified, and considered as militias of the ruling parties of PUK and KDP.
Sadr has long been accused of ties to strong ties with the Iranian regime. He had resided in the central Iranian city of Qom for over a decade before making an unannounced return to Iraq’s holy Shiite city of Najaf earlier this week.
He acknowledged Iranian influence on Iraqi Shiite militias, claiming he has told Iran not to intervene in Iraqi affairs. Iranian intervention in the past two months has decreased by more than “70%”, he claimed.
Foreign powers also hold sway over Iraq’s Sunni militias, Sadr maintained. He said he has held an exclusionary stance towards all foreign influence over Iraqi sovereignty.
“If Iran intervenes a little too much [in Iraqi affairs], I tell them directly that they are interfering too much. I am not afraid of them. I have told them and KSA [Kingdom of Saudi Arabia] Crown Prince Bin Salman, hundreds of times. I have notified them all. I even told Turkey they are occupiers of Iraqi soil and need to leave.”
Sadr did not equate US troop expulsion from Iraq with the dissolution of US-Iraq relations, instead calling for their relations to be reconfigured from one of “occupation” into one of “equal treatment.”
The Iraqi cleric did not rule out armed conflict to root US presence out of Iraq if other channels are unsuccessful.
“I believe Iraq has had enough war. We can get America out through other [non-violent] means. If we can’t do it through other means, then we are ready to fight them.”
For many years, transparency organizations, lawmakers, observers, and international organizations have accused senior Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government KRG officials of corruption, especially with regard to expropriation of the Kurdistan’s oil income.
Kurdistan considered as the most corrupted part of Iraq. According to Kurdish lawmakers and leaked documents billions of dollars are missing from Iraqi Kurdistan’s oil revenues.
The ruling Barzani clan have been routinely accused by critics and oberevers of neptunism and amassing huge wealth from oil business for the family instead of serving the population. KDP party leader and ex-president Massoud Barzani remains the most powerful leader in the shadow according to analysts. Massoud’s son Masrour is the Kurdistan region’s prime minister and his nephew Nechirvan Barzani is president of Kurdistan.
Also the ruling Talabani family and its allies have been routinely accused by transparency organizations and observers of corruption and amassing huge wealth from oil business in the the areas controlled by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party.
Copyright © 2020, respective author or news agency, Ekurd.net | rudaw.net | nrttv.com