New York Times Editorial: Still Unfinished Business

New York Times Editorial: Still Unfinished Business
Copyright by the New York Times
Published: May 3, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/04/opinion/04mon1.html?ref=global


President Obama has correctly refocused American attention on Afghanistan and Pakistan, the real front in the war on terror. But the recent surge in bombings is an alarming reminder of all of the unfinished business from President Bush’s unnecessary war in Iraq.

As American troops begin to hand combat posts over to the Iraqi Army, Sunni insurgents are trying to exploit any weakness. In April, more than 300 Iraqis died, up from under 200 in January. Eighteen American troops were killed, the highest toll in six months.

The problem isn’t Mr. Obama’s order to end America’s longest-running war. It is the failure of Iraq’s Shiite-led government to make the political changes that are the only chance for holding the country together.

We had hoped that the clear timetable for an American withdrawal would focus the attention of Iraq’s leaders. So far it hasn’t — or at least not enough. Washington needs to be pressing them a lot harder, using all of the levers it has, including aid and Baghdad’s appetite for American-made military equipment.

Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has reneged on a commitment to find government jobs for tens of thousands of members of the Sunni Awakening Councils, the former insurgents whose decision to switch sides helped change the course of the war. His government has also failed to implement a year-old law that would allow former members of the Baathist Party — who were banned from government service after the 2003 invasion — to return to their positions or collect pensions.

Old rivalries and hatreds are difficult to put aside. The decline in oil revenue makes it especially hard to expand government employment right now. But Iraq will pay a much steeper price if disaffected Sunnis turn again on the government.

Ethnic tensions are also growing in the north where the Kurds are pressing to annex oil-rich Kirkuk to their semiautonomous region. Turkmen and Arab residents insist on staying with the central government. United Nations mediators have proposed compromises, like making Kirkuk an autonomous city run by all three ethnic groups. If an agreement cannot be crafted, Washington, Baghdad and the Kurds may have to consider outside, possibly U.N.-led administration for some period.

Ways must also be found to mitigate frictions in Nineveh Province, a hotbed of Sunni insurgency. Sunni Arabs sat out the 2005 elections, leaving the Kurdish minority to run virtually unopposed. The Sunnis won big in January’s provincial elections and now dominate the provincial council, its budget and patronage jobs. An Iraqi government spokesman said Sunday that an Iraq-United States security agreement would not be modified to allow American troops to stay in Mosul, the provincial capital, past the June 30 deadline. But if violence escalates, that may have to be revisited.

For two long months, Washington had no ambassador in Iraq. Now that Christopher Hill — the veteran diplomat who led negotiations with North Korea during the Bush years — is finally in place, he must move quickly to tackle these and other challenges. Iraq’s government must be pressed to finally adopt a long-delayed oil law to equitably manage oil fields and share profits. There is still no plan for returning home the estimated four million Iraqis who are refugees or displaced inside Iraq.

Washington must also find a way to work with Iran and other of Iraq’s neighbors to try to limit outside meddling as American troops prepare to go. The Pentagon has made progress building up Iraq’s army and police, but there is much more training and equipping to be done before they can take over from American troops.

Even then, there will be no chance of a durable peace without a lot more political and economic reform and the participation of Iraq’s neighbors.