Baghdad, Iraq – Iraq’s government said Monday that its soldiers would no longer participate in raids on mosques in their fight against an increasingly violent insurgency, banning a tactic that Sunni Muslim Arab leaders had long argued was provoking sectarian strife.
Later in the day, Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari met with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, the most influential spiritual leader of Iraq’s Shiite Muslim majority, and said they discussed the “participation of Sunnis in the political process,” among other topics.
The conciliatory gestures by the Shiite-led government came as a recent wave of car bombings and assassinations continued across Iraq – including a rocket attack on a Baghdad university that killed two engineering students.
Authorities also discovered the bodies of 13 more people who had been slain execution-style, according to the Defense Ministry, bringing the total to more than 50 found in the past two days.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, while visiting Iraq on Sunday, had urged the government to try to bridge sectarian divisions by further incorporating Sunnis into governance.
The minority group is underrepresented in the National Assembly because Sunnis largely boycotted Iraq’s Jan. 30 elections.
But influential Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said Monday evening that U.S. forces were responsible for the growing conflict among the Iraqi people, and he called for their removal.
It was the fiery al-Sadr’s first speech since his militia clashed with U.S. forces in August in Najaf, a city holy to Shiites.
In an afternoon news conference in Baghdad, Defense Minister Sadoun Dulame said he had received “many complaints from citizens against the Defense Ministry about the random raids and arrest campaigns that have been done by the Iraqi forces.”
From now on, he said, “it is strictly prohibited that any employee of the Defense Ministry raid worship places.”
Responding to another frequent Sunni complaint, Dulame said he would work to see that persons detained by the government were processed more quickly and released if no ties to terrorism were found.
U.S. and Iraqi officials believe the insurgency is composed largely of Iraqi Sunnis and Arab fighters from other countries.
On Monday, Sunni leaders welcomed the government’s new policy, although some did so cautiously.
“This is a proper decision that came at the right time. The armed forces shouldn’t enter mosques or worship places and disrespect them,” said Naseer Ani, head of the political office for the Iraqi Islamic Party, the country’s largest Sunni political party.
But the decision could pose a problem for U.S. forces, who in recent clashes with insurgents have relied upon Iraqi troops to enter mosques, where insurgents sometimes take refuge. U.S. commanders believe the Iraqi troops’ presence would be less offensive to worshipers.
