Allawi-Sunni tieup: "A major achievement for the regional Arab regimes"

The Sadrist-oriented news site Nahrainnet.net publishes a report that dovetails with the reports (see prior post) that a delegation including Allawi and the Sunni-Arab political-party leaders will be holding discussions with US government and congressional people in Washington soon. As far as the visit is concerned, this Nahrainnet report says the group is going to be touring a number of Western and Arab capitals to gain support, and Washington will merely be the first stop.

But this report also has a lot to say, citing "diplomatic sources in Brussels", about the nature of this tieup between Allawi and the Sunni-Arab parties. In fact it calls this a "new alliance" which has resulted from three months of difficult negotitions, centered in Amman, and aided not only by the CIA but also by Arab intelligence agencies, and the report names Prince Bandar bin Sultan, head of the Saudi national security agency, and the head of Jordanian security, as two of the major facilitators.

The "new alliance", this report says, represents a major achievement for the Arab regimes, which have been unhappy with Shiite influence in Baghdad, which they see tantamount to an Iranian threat to the stability of the region. As far as the actual content of the agreement is concerned, the this report says:

These diplomatic sources in Brussels say the agreement between Ayad Allawi and the Sunni Arab political leaders, supported by the regional Arab powers, especially Saudi Arabia which is putting a lot of stock in this, will represent a new political axis in Iraq with a weight that has to be taken into account, particularly since this agreement talks about [concrete and meaningful matters, including] political apportionment to each of the parties in future, in the event of success in Parliament or outside of Parliament, and there is complete agreement on toppling the government of Nuri al-Maliki and on working to exploit the differences that are raging within the [United Iraqi] Alliance, and taking advantage of the strong American pressure on the government for the return of the Baathists to their former positions in the political and security areas.

And the sources said: This agreement between Allawi and the Sunni Arabs represents a major political achievement for the regional Arab regimes, which have a negative attitude to the Shiite influence on the Iraqi government, which they regard as an extension of Iranian influence, which has come to represent a threat to Arab national security.

Representatives of this alliance are expected to visit a number of Western and Arab capitals to gather more support. Their first stop will be Washington, where they will meet with Democratic and Republican members of Congress, and with administration people concerned with Iraq.