Iraq buys time for US troop pact
By Mohammed al-Zaidi*
KUT, eastern Iraq - One night in April, United States troops stormed into Ahmed
al-Baderi's house, shot dead his wife and brother and ignited outrage over a
sensitive deal defining the US forces' remit in Iraq.
"They tore down the door with a military truck," said Baderi. "My brother
Khalid went to investigate, but they shot him dead. Then they killed my wife."
The next day, hundreds of demonstrators marched on a government office in the
eastern city of Kut, where the raid took place, calling for an end to American
"occupation".
On state television, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki demanded the United States
hand over to Iraqi courts the troops who had carried
out the raid. He accused American forces of violating the Status of Forces
Agreement (SOFA) - a pact overseeing the remainder of their deployment in Iraq
that Maliki had helped to broker.
The US said its troops had behaved properly and within the provisions of the
agreement. A military statement released after the raid said the troops had
shot dead a man who approached them carrying a weapon. A woman who "moved into
the line of fire" also died, despite receiving emergency treatment from a
military doctor.
Four months after the incident, few questions have been answered, but much of
the outrage has ebbed. Baderi said he had received an apology from the US
military and payment totaling 100 million dinars (about US$90,000) from Iraqi
and US officials.
Meanwhile, a referendum on the SOFA that was due to have been held this summer
has been postponed until January. It will now coincide with Iraqi parliamentary
elections.
The government announced that the plebiscite had been delayed to save money.
Its critics said Maliki did not want to risk his re-election prospects with the
public defeat of an accord for which he had claimed credit.
Shock and skepticism
The SOFA describes the terms under which US troops can operate in Iraq as they
slowly reduce their deployment. The deal was worked out over 2008 between
Baghdad and the government of former US president George W Bush.
It envisages a phased withdrawal for US combat troops, starting with an exit
from most of Iraq's towns and cities by June 30, 2009. By August 2010, the deal
says, most US forces would leave the country. Of those that remain, all would
be gone by the end of 2011.
The agreement was ratified by the Iraqi parliament last December. Critics who
said the deal was a smokescreen for prolonging the US military occupation were
promised it would be put to a referendum this summer.
The accord includes provisions for some US troops to stay behind to assist,
train or advise their Iraqi counterparts. To carry out military operations in
Iraq, US troops must seek prior Iraqi approval and be accompanied by Iraqi
forces - or they must show they are acting in self-defense. They cannot be
tried in Iraqi courts as long they can prove they were on an official mission.
A US military statement, released hours after the raid in Kut on April 26, said
the operation had been "fully coordinated and approved by the Iraqi
government".
However, Iraqi officials in Baghdad and in Kut are adamant that the Americans
broke the rules when they attacked the Baderi house. The Iraqi cabinet called
the assault an "unacceptable breach" of the SOFA.
Yusef Mihawish, the deputy governor of Wasit province, where Kut is located,
insisted that US forces had not gone through the appropriate channels to
receive approval for the raid.
"We have a security committee, chaired by the provincial governor, and we have
a joint operations room with the US forces. The Americans should have informed
us of the raid through the operations room," Mihawish said. "Instead, they
violated the security agreement."
Wasit provincial council chairman Mahmud Talal said, "There was no coordination
between local authorities and the forces that stormed the house." He said he
learnt of the raid only the following morning.
Among some people in Kut, shock at the raid mingled with skepticism that Iraqi
officials had no warning of it.
"How can a military force enter a city without the knowledge of the local
authorities?" asked Abdul-Fattah, a vehicle mechanic. "Where is the local
government and what role does it play?"
Conflicting accounts
Most of the doubt has focused on the US military's official account of the
raid.
Its statement on April 26 said nine suspects were held in the raid, which was
aimed at a "criminal network" smuggling weapons to Shi'ite militiamen. Wasit
province borders Iran and is believed to be a supply route for insurgents.
Baderi, a tribal chief in his mid-fifties with a greying beard, denied his
family was involved in crime or insurgency. He said US forces arrested him,
several family members and a neighbor.
"We were taken away by helicopter," he told the Institute for War and Peace
Reporting (IWPR) . "The investigator asked me to identify people in some
photos, but I did not know any of them."
The Americans released all their captives shortly afterwards - according to
Baderi, after admitting they had made a mistake.
On the evening on April 26, the US commander for the region, Colonel Richard M
Francey, appeared at a news conference with Iraqi officials and apologized for
the assault in Kut.
According to Baderi, Iraqi and US officials later gave him money they said was
intended to cover the cost of funerals for his brother and wife.
He said he received 60 million dinars (US$54,500) from US forces and another 40
million dinars from the Iraqi government.
The US military in Iraq and at its headquarters in Florida did not respond to
IWPR's requests for comment on the Kut raid.
However, Major John Redfield, a spokesman for the US Central Command in
Florida, said the US gives "condolence payments to recognize the loss to people
who may have suffered harm as a result of our ongoing fight with the enemy".
"Payments in these situations are meant to console individuals and do not
constitute an admission that deaths resulted from unlawful acts or that US
forces were at fault," he said.
Tariq Harb, a prominent lawyer and activist in Baghdad, said the payment to
Baderi had calmed the outcry over the raid. Harb attributed the dispute over
the assault to "a severe lack of coordination between Iraqi and American
forces" and said it was unlikely to happen again.
"The raid served as a wake-up call to US troops. Moreover, there is less risk
of friction now, as most US troops have withdrawn from the towns and villages,"
he said, citing the latest move under the SOFA.
Conflicting Iraqi and US accounts of the raid may be hard to reconcile, Harb
said, but they would eventually become irrelevant. He said no US soldiers would
face charges in Iraqi courts as the US had insisted they were on an official
mission in Kut - and therefore immune from prosecution.
A timely delay?
Several politicians have criticized clauses within the SOFA that they say give
US troops too much room for maneuver.
Iman al-Asadi, a member of the Iraqi parliament's legal committee, whose
Shi'ite party is likely to challenge Maliki in January, said she had objected
to the provision that allows US troops to defend themselves whenever necessary.
"This is a loophole that can be used by the Americans ... The phrase is loose
and liable to be interpreted in several ways," she said. "I asked the law
committee to change it, but in vain."
Opponents of Maliki - and of the SOFA - had hoped incidents such as the Kut
raid would mobilize public opinion in time for a referendum on the accord
scheduled for this summer. They are angry at the decision to delay the vote so
that it coincides with parliamentary elections in January.
Fallah Hasan Shensal, a member of parliament loyal to the anti-American Shi'ite
cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, said the government had sought the postponement because
it knew the public would reject the pact.
"They have rescheduled the referendum for a day when the voters will be
distracted by the elections," he said.
Abbas al-Shihabi, a political commentator, said the government feared voters
would punish it for other, broader failures by voting against the SOFA this
summer.
Under the terms of the SOFA, any party that wishes to withdraw from the
agreement must give its partner a year's notice.
Thus a possible rejection of the pact by the Iraqi public next January would
still give US troops until January 2011 to adapt their strategy. By this date,
the vast majority of American troops would already have withdrawn from Iraq
under the terms of the existing agreement.
"By delaying the referendum, the government is trying to make it obsolete,"
Shensal said.
Officials allied to Maliki disagree. Walid al-Hilli, a senior member of the
prime minister's Da'wa party and head of its human-rights office, said the
plebiscite was postponed to ensure security and "reduce cost and effort".
Either way, Hilli said, most Iraqis were likely to accept the SOFA because it
was backed by political blocs that represented them.
Harb admitted that even if Iraqis voted against the SOFA, the referendum would
have "little impact" because US forces would still have a year within which to
withdraw.
But he believes the public will not reject the agreement. The majority of
Iraqis and political blocs supported the phased pullout of US forces, he said.
Moreover, he added, the impact of incidents such as the assault in April faded
with time.
"The Kut raid has been forgotten," Harb said. "Iraqi society is full of
tragedies."
* IWPR-trained journalist Mohammed al-Zaidi produced this report from
Kut. IWPR-trained journalist Basim al-Shara and IWPR Iraq editor Neil
Arun contributed from Baghdad and Irbil.
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