U.S. Embassy in Iraq Refuses to Negotiate

[AverillGalena]

BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. Embassy officials refuse to negotiate with insurgents or mediate between militants and the Iraqi government, despite overtures by Sunni Arabs claiming to represent armed groups, a U.S. official said Friday."We do not talk to people who have killed or who provided material assistance," said the official, who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity because of U.S. government rules.
The official said the embassy is often approached by Sunni Arabs who claim to have been sent by insurgents to present demands.
"We have never negotiated through these people with insurgents. We deliver a very simple message: 'Stop the violence. If you don't stop the violence, eventually our forces will take you out,'" the official said.
He said those who approach the embassy are usually academics, businessmen or midlevel officials of the former ruling Baath Party.
Their demands center on paying pensions for former military officers, rehiring former officers in the new Iraqi army, or providing a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S.-led troops. Such overtures have increased since the Jan. 30 elections, he said.
"We say: 'We cannot deal with that. If you want to negotiate something, go talk to the Iraqi government. The only thing we can tell you is stop fighting.'"
Those Sunnis who approach the Americans make it clear they're representing the homegrown part of the insurgency and not foreign fighters like Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the official said, adding the insurgency lacks a unified leadership.
On Wednesday, former electricity minister and Sunni Arab politician Ayham al-Samarie announced formation of a political group to represent the demands of an umbrella organization of insurgents asking for a timetable for U.S. troop withdrawal and an end to all military offensives in Iraqi cities.
But three insurgent groups_ the Ansar al-Sunnah Army, the Army of Mujahedeen and the Islamic Army in Iraq_ allegedly said in an Internet statement that al-Samarie was spreading lies and issued a death threat on his life.
Reports of negotiations with militants gained renewed attention after Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said talks have taken place with some insurgent leaders in what appeared to be a subtle shift of strategy to focus more on political solutions to the violence.
Efforts by the Shiite-led Iraqi government to include Sunni Arabs in the Cabinet and in a parliament committee drafting the country's constitution were meant to "undercut the political support that the insurgency has," he said.
Sunni Arabs, who form the backbone of the insurgency, largely stayed away from the polls in January either out of fear of attacks or to heed boycott calls. Efforts to include them in the political process are seen as key to taking the steam out of Iraq's bloody insurgency.
The U.S. military in Iraq believes it faces at most 20,000 active insurgents, the vast majority of them Sunni, Air Force Col. Dewey G. Ford, a spokesman, said in an e-mail.
That amounts to a little more than two-tenths of Iraq's estimated Sunni population of roughly 9.1 million, he said.
Ford was responding to a request to detail statements by Army Gen. George Casey, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, that the Iraqi insurgency involves less than one-tenth of one percent of Iraq's population of 26 million. Casey called his figure a worst-case estimate.


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