Sunnis: Minister's arrest warrant targets sects

An arrest warrant against a Sunni Cabinet minister is another step by the Shiite-led government to marginalise the Iraq’s Sunni minority, the official’s political organisation said today.

The comments were made one day after Iraqi commandos raided the Baghdad home of Culture Minister Asad Kamal al-Hashimi and detained about 40 of his guards. The minister was not at home at the time, but officials said a warrant had been issued for his arrest in a 2005 assassination attempt on another politician.

Those moves have angered Sunni groups and politicians, who warn they could jeopardise US-backed reconciliation efforts. The United States has been pushing for a greater role for Sunnis, who dominated Iraq’s politics for decades until the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime in 2003.

Muhannad al-Issawi, a spokesman for Sunni politician Adnan al-Dulaimi, said the warrant was “a political matter not a judicial one”.

“It aims to marginalise the Sunnis” and their main parliamentary bloc, the Iraqi Accordance Front, al-Issawi told The Associated Press .

He said Prime Minister Nouri Maliki told a Sunni delegation that he would halt the moves against al-Hashimi. Mr Maliki’s office denied the claim, saying the case was a matter for the judiciary.

Al-Dulaimi told the US-funded Radio Sawa that al-Hashimi’s departure from the country “will be facilitated”. He added that “I believe he will leave Iraq and declare his resignation,” al-Dulaimi said, adding that it seems that an agreement has been reached with the government on the case.

“We will feel relaxed when this case is closed and is not raised by the media or any other side,” the Sunni leader said.

The move against al-Hashimi came after he was identified by two suspected militants as the mastermind of a February 8, 2005, attack against secular politician Mithal al-Alusi, an Iraqi government spokesman said. Al-Alusi escaped unharmed but two of his sons were killed.

“The two who planned and carried out the killings of Mithal al-Alusi’s two sons confessed that they took orders from him,” spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said yesterday.