Friday, June 11, 2004

U.S. Alliance Is Built on Shifting Sands

News Analysis: The Constitution: Kurds Find U.S. Alliance Is Built on Shifting Sands:
"'It's not just that we have been misled by the Americans,' said a high-ranking Kurdish official. 'It's also that they change their position day to day without any focus on real strategy in Iraq. There's a level of mismanagement and incompetence that is shocking.'

The temporary constitution, hammered out under American supervision in March, was hailed by the American authorities at the time as one that would prevail until a new constitution is written and ratified and a permanent government takes office under its provisions.

But Iraq's new leaders, in statements this week, described it as only operative until the beginning of next year, when a newly elected national assembly convenes to write the permanent charter.

Iraq's new prime minister, Iyad Allawi, who was picked under a process led by the United Nations, said in Baghdad that the document approved last March remains the law of the land for now. His comment was intended to reassure Kurds, but Kurdish spokesmen said Thursday that it may have had the opposite effect."

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/11/politics/11DIPL.html

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con·cept: U.S. Alliance Is Built on Shifting Sands