World

Sunnis Remain Iraq Stumbling Block

August 24, 2005 / 8:07 AM EDT / CBS/AP

The head of the committee drafting Iraq's new constitution said Tuesday three days are not enough to win over the Sunni Arabs and the document they rejected may ultimately have to be approved by parliament as is and submitted to the people in a referendum.

Iraqi leaders completed a draft Monday night and submitted it to parliament but with only minutes to go before a midnight deadline deferred a vote to allow three days to convince Sunni Arab negotiators to accept it.

Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said that a new constitution will not end all the violence in Iraq, acknowledging that the continuing turbulence "has to be a heart-wrenching thing" for the families of U.S. forces still fighting insurgents there.

"The process has been delayed a bit, but democracy has never been described as speedy, efficient or perfect," Rumsfeld said during a Pentagon briefing.

At a news conference Tuesday, Humam Hammoudi, chairman of the drafting committee, acknowledged that three days would probably be too short a time to win over Sunnis, who objected to wording on federalism, Saddam Hussein's Baath party, the description of Iraq as an Islamic — but not Arab — country and other parts of the document.

Asked how to break the impasse, Hammoudi said "the Iraqi people will rule" and suggested that the elected parliament could debate the issues and take a decision. Shiites and Kurds, who accepted the agreement, dominate the assembly. Approving the draft and submitting it to the people in an Oct. 15 referendum risks a backlash among Sunni Arabs, who are at the forefront of the insurgency.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad urged the Iraqis to work "in spirit of compromise" and "take the national interest into account" when they resume talks Wednesday.

He said "every effort needs to be made" to win Sunni Arab support for the draft and that it "behooves" Iraq's other communities — Shiites and Kurds — to "reach out" to the Sunnis in the interest of national unity.

Despite the possible impasse, CBS News Correspondent Lara Logan reports that the conflict of ideas shows sparks of growth in the newly democratic government. Instead of boycotting the political process as they did in the January election, the

Sunnis are now actively engaging (video)

and participating in the process.

In related developments:

A U.S. Marine was killed Monday when a roadside bomb exploded near his vehicle near the troubled city of Fallujah, the military said. The latest death brought to at least 65 the number of American troops killed in Iraq this month.

A U.S. soldier, an American contractor and five Iraqis were killed Tuesday when a suicide bomber detonated an explosive device in Baquba, the military said. Nine Americans were wounded total.

President Bush, defending his Iraq war policy in the face of anti-war opposition and slumping approval ratings, says pulling out before the mission is complete would dishonor the memory of all the Americans who fought and died in pursuit of freedom. CBS News Radio correspondent Mark Knoller reports that Bush compared the difficulty of drafting Iraq's constitution to America's and said Iraq's document will include provisions for women's rights.

Iraq resumed oil exports at half the normal rate Tuesday, a day after a power outage halted shipments most of the day, a tanker agent said. Pumping at Iraq's two offshore export terminals in the northern Gulf resumed in the early hours Tuesday at the rate of 32,000 barrels per hour, about half the normal rate, said Mohammed Hadi, head of Iraq operations for Norton Lilly International.

Iraq's Environment Minister Narmin Othman escaped an assassination attempt when gunmen attacked her convoy, police said Tuesday. Othman belongs to President Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.

In Samarra, a Sunni-dominated city 60 miles north of Baghdad, hundreds of people lined up Tuesday in front of voter registration centers. "We came here ... to register our names and we should not commit a mistake as we did before," said resident Hameed Hassan, of the earlier Sunni election boycott.

Hammoud noted that unlike the Shiite and Kurd negotiators, the Sunni Arabs were not elected parliament members but were appointed to the committee. Sunni Arabs won only 17 of the 275 parliament seats because so many Sunnis boycotted the Jan. 30 election.

"Those who are representing the brother Sunni Arabs are not elected," Hammoudi said. "Therefore, who can say that they really represent the people on the street ... therefore the Sunnis have to express their opinion."

Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, a Shiite, appeared to make an overture to the minority.

"Some of the political groups have some reservations and we will study them and try to reach a solution in the next three days," he said at a news conference in Baghdad on Tuesday.

"Our Sunni Arab brothers faced some circumstances in the past that prevented them from having real representation (in parliament) in what is equal to their demography and we hope that in the future they will be better represented."

But Saleh al-Mutlaq, one of four top Sunni negotiators, said more than 20 issues still divide the sides.

Sunnis — who dominated Iraqi society under Saddam — oppose decentralization, fearing it would cut them out of the country's oil wealth and leave them powerless.

"This is not the time to achieve all that one can at the expense of others," U.S. Ambassador Khalilzad told reporters Tuesday. He said the time had come "to build the new Iraq on new principles."

Hammoudi said a federal structure was critical to maintaining democracy in Iraq.

"With all this oil income the central government will turn into, whether we like it or not, a dictatorship," he said.

Sunni leaders have threatened to order their followers to vote "no" in the October referendum on the new constitution unless their objections are addressed.

Rumsfeld dismissed the idea that objections from Sunnis could lead to civil war. President Bush, asked earlier about the possibility that a constitutional conflict could trigger a civil war, said: "The Sunnis have got to make a choice: Do they want to live in a society that's free?"

Rumsfeld said the Pentagon expected more insurgent attacks as the country finalized its constitution and attributed the high number of deaths in a fraction of them to insurgents "becoming more sophisticated" in developing deadly explosives.

He rejected the idea that the United States has gotten bogged down in Iraq like it did in Vietnam, saying polls show that anger toward the instability caused by insurgents is growing.

"Regrettably, completing the constitution is not likely to end all the violence in Iraq or solve all of the country's problems," he said.