[lbo-talk] Britain brings comedy to Basara

H. Curtiss Leung hncl at panix.com
Sat Apr 12 21:14:26 PDT 2003


Yep--and this joker is installing former Ba'ath to be in charge of the cops. Cute, no?

from Friday's WSJ:

Like most notables who assembled in Basra to organize, Sheikh

Muzahim voiced ambivalent feelings about where to go from here. He

showed little desire for a complete break with the past. "Not all

the people in Baath are bad. Most aren't," he said. In fact, the

new Basra administration includes some Baathists, and also members

of the area's dominant Saadoun tribe.

His priority: "to bring back police and to bring back security." He

said he had given orders to Iraqi policemen to return to work -- not

easy, considering that the war gutted most police stations and that

coalition forces forbid Iraqis to carry weapons. Sheikh Muzahim said

existing senior officers will lead the police. He also reappointed a

Baathist as civil defense chief. "We know them, we will check them, and

we will select the best of them," Sheikh Muzahim said.

(at http://online.wsj.com/article_print/0,,SB105000955752323600,00.html if you subscribe. I'll email it if anyone wants the whole sordid story; contact me offlist.)

Curtiss


> Violence broke out in Basra after a sheikh asked by British commanders to
> become the new leader of the province was revealed to be a former
> brigadier-general in Saddam Hussein's army and a one-time member of the
> Ba'ath party.
> Several hundred protesters hurled stones at the house of Sheikh Muzahim
> Mustafa Kanan Tamimi as he met other local dignitaries to discuss how to
> restore order.
>



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