(Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim)Shiite leader offers Iraq security plan (Federal Regions)

[maddezmom]

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A prominent Shiite leader said Monday that setting up federal regions in Iraq would solve the country's problems, adding that Shiites are being subjected to mass killings but they should not retaliate by using violence.

Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, leader of the Shiite bloc in the 275-member parliament, was speaking at a Shiite mosque in central Baghdad to mark Ashoura, one of the holiest days in the Shiite calendar commemorating the 7th century death of the Prophet Muhammad's grandson Imam Hussein. Thousands of people dressed in black in a sign of mourning attended the ceremony at the Khulani Mosque.

"I reaffirm that the establishing of regions will help us in solving many problems that we are suffering from. Moreover, it represents the best solution for these problems," al-Hakim said. "We affirm the necessity of establishing the south and center and Baghdad regions after the people vote on it."

Central regions south of Baghdad and the southern Iraqi provinces are predominantly Shiites and al-Hakim has called in the past for setting up the "region of the center and the south." The predominantly Shiite south and Kurdish north have been relatively safer than the mixed provinces such as Baghdad and Diyala, that witnessed sectarian killings, or the Sunni regions of Anbar and Salahuddin where insurgents are active.

more:http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070129/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_shiites

[Kagemusha]

1. I'm sure this plan makes the South easier for al-Hakim to rule

and treat as part of Greater Iran.

I'm not sure what it does for Iraq. I'm not sure he cares.

[Eugene]

2. Even if he is sincere, his solution treats a symptom, not the problem.

The federal regions can only help themselves if they get their fair share
of Iraq's resources, especially oil revenue and reconstruction funds.
That isn't happening. Unless Hakim proposes that the central government
works in the national interest, all he is doing is advancing partition.

He would also free the Shi'ite factions to fight each other in souhern Iraq.