Author: AFP
Publication: Khaleej Times
Date: November 30, 2006
URL: http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/focusoniraq/2006/November/focusoniraq_November255.xml§ion=focusoniraq
Iraq's Shiite leaders on Thursday said they
were angered by a Saudi Arabian official saying that Riyadh would support
the violence-wracked country's Sunni Arabs in the event of a US pullout.
Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki said: "We
will not countenance any language interfering in Iraq on the pretext of defending
sects."
Saudi security expert Nawaf Obaid wrote in
Wednesday's Washington Post that withdrawal of US forces could see Saudi Arabia
giving Iraq's Sunnis funds, arms and supplies to counter Teheran's alleged
support for Iraqi Shiite militias.
Obaid is managing director of the Riyadh-based
Saudi National Security Assessment Project and also the private security and
energy adviser to the Saudi ambassador to the US, Prince Turki Al Faisal.
If the United States leaves, Obaid wrote,
"one of the first consequences will be massive Saudi intervention to
stop Iranian-backed Shiite militias from butchering Iraqi Sunnis".
In the southern holy city of Najaf, Mohammed
Al Juburi, secretary general of the Shiite Fadhila party, reacted angrily
to the article, saying: "This is a sectarian and un-Islamic statement."
"We reject any interference in Iraq's
affairs, whether from Saudi Arabia or Iran," he added.
Teheran is regularly accused of aiding militias
linked to Iraq's powerful Shiite politicians in the ongoing sectarian conflict
with the members of the minority Sunni Arab community.
Sheikh Abdel Hadhi Al Daraji, an aide of radical
Shiite cleric Moqtada Al Sadr, called for an intervention by Riyadh by way
of seeking a timetable for the withdrawal of US-led coalition troops from
Iraq.
"We advise Saudi Arabia and the neighbouring
countries to seriously work over the exit of the occupying forces first and
to mend fences among politicians, both Shiites and Sunnis," Daraji told
AFP.
"I think the neighbouring countries,
if they wanted to interfere in Iraqi affairs, such interference should be
in favour of the whole nation and not one party or another," he said.
"This is the grave mistake neighbours
are making," he added.
Obaid wrote that Saudi King Abdullah pledged
to US President George W. Bush that he would not intervene, despite the rise
in bloody sectarian reprisal killings between Iraq's majority Shiites and
minority Sunnis.
However, that would change if the US begins
pulling its troops out, Obaid warned.
"Options now include providing Sunni
military leaders... with the same types of assistance -- funding, arms and
logistical support -- that Iran has been giving to Shiite armed groups for
years."
"Another possibility includes the establishment
of new Sunni brigades to combat the Iranian-backed militias."