Nermeen Al-Mufti catches the vibe of Baghdad on the eve of 9 April The fourth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad saw Iraqi flags fluttering above the roofs of homes and public offices; even the walls of the main squares were turned into flag murals, evoking dreams of national unity. Prohibited in northern Iraq, the flag has served as a cover for thousands of coffins since American tanks arrived in the city on 9 April 2003 -- "Liberation Day". Those who would have celebrated it, however, ended up imposing a 24-hour ban on the movement of vehicles, including bicycles. No one cared to ask who might be responsible for continued occupation, one consequence of which is the ongoing civil war. UN resolutions calling for an autonomous government have had no effect. Comparing the last four years to life under the former regime, it is impossible to ignore 650,000 casualties -- an official American figure published six months ago -- with a monthly average of 1,800, indeed, a simple calculation raises it to over a million. According to the UN, the emigration of Iraqis is the largest from one country since WWII; for the fourth time, Baghdad was declared the least safe city on earth. More significant as an indicator was the 13 February US security plan, which involves suffusing the capital with troops in a show of force with a view to maintaining law and order: its bid to bring back families who had fled their neighbourhoods sees terrorised people hesitantly reclaiming their lives. In its eighth week the plan has not prevented the number of casualties from rising to 1,869 in March, 300 more than the February figure, or unidentified corpses once again appearing on the street at a rate of 15 per day -- a fivefold increase since the plan was launched. In fact the very implementation of the plan has further emphasised the difficulty of implementing security. According to Brigadier Atta Qasim, plan spokesperson, certain areas -- including Sadr City (the stronghold of the Mahdi army) and Al-Adhamiya will be cordoned off to help control "the terrorists". On the other hand the situation within the Al-Maliki government is critical, with collapse on the horizon after the Iraqi Accord Front of Sunnis (the third largest bloc in parliament) suspended its participation and its leader, Adnan Al-Dalimi, has since declared that he is ready for a complete "withdrawal from government if necessary"; official security had stormed the offices and homes of 18 Sunni MPs, seizing money and computers, breaking furniture and arresting security staff. In an exclusive interview Mohamed Al-Dayni of the Sunni Iraqi National Dialogue Front explained, "More than 500 members of the Iraqi security forces raided my office. They confiscated my money and that of MP Nasser Al-Janabi, destroyed the office and detained my security staff. When I contacted the American forces and they came for investigation, we discovered that the raid had taken place under the direct order of Prime Minister Al-Maliki. This was also confirmed by those in charge of the forces that stormed the offices of the other 20 Sunni MPs." He added that the Al-Maliki government had been bungling its work and referring to the national forces as terrorists and opponents of the political process even as they were participating in it: "The Al-Maliki government has begun to die; such fumbling is a desperate attempt to survive." In the meantime the Sadrist Movement, following orders from Muqtada Al-Sadr, dismissed the two parliamentarians Qusay Abdel-Wahab and Salaam Al-Maliki due to their meeting with the Americans -- a charge they denied, claiming it emanated from "third parties working to break the unity of the Sadrists". Yet MP Salih Al-Akili affirmed the charge. On the other hand, the leader of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution -- also a member of the constitution amendment committee in the House of Representatives -- Sheikh Jalaleddin Al-Saghir, criticised the Kurds for calling for the division of Iraq: "The working paper the Kurdistan alliance presented to the committee includes changing the name of Iraq to the Republic of Federal Iraq and allowing the province of Kurdistan to have a special representative in the United Nations and other international organisations. The Kurdish plan will elicit much pushing and pulling between political groups." For its part the integrity committee issued a statement announcing that 80 billion dollars have been lost since the occupation began, giving way to much popular discontent. According to political analyst Jinan Ali, "The statement of the integrity committee is not the first and will not be the last. Under the occupation, Iraq has registered a degree of corruption no other state has reached in the records of the international transparency organisation." On the anniversary of the occupation, she added, "The overwhelming majority of Iraqis see the new Iraq as truly new, with the highest emigration rates in history and unprecedented sectarian splits that undermine their future. They underline the assassination and abduction of academics and intellectuals, not to mention some 500 journalists who were killed or who fled during the term of Nouri Al-Maliki alone. A large number of people abducted from the exchange department at the Ministry of Higher Education have not been found, except for the corpses of the department head and his assistant, for example. With the disappearance of public services and complete loss of security, Iraqis are feeling the weight of the occupation and the imbalance of the political process. They also fear the division of Iraq in the light of the Kurdish insistence on a referendum in Kirkuk, a city rich in oil whose demography the Kurds are forcefully changing..." Nor are the occupiers spared. 88 Americans (double the number of Iraqi security forces and army members) were killed in March; this week, already, 10 Americans and four British were killed in Basra. Last Sunday a new American force of 3,000 troops from the third brigade arrived in Baghdad, to be deployed in and around the city. At the same time the American- Iraqi Operation Black Hawk was launched in the city of Al-Diwaniya, some 200 km south of Baghdad to end clashes between the Mahdi army (which had relocated from Baghdad) and Iraqi security following the assassination of the Supreme Council's representative there. A curfew remains in place in the city, where dozens of civilians have been caught in the fray. Sources in Al-Diwaniya say the religious militias have declared war in a number of governorates in the south, including Al-Ammara, Basra, and Al-Kut, to which elements of the Mahdi have withdrawn from Al-Diwaniya. For his part Muqtada Al-Sadr -- still in hiding -- has called for an end to the fighting between his army and the government police forces. He is said to be in Iran, though his supporters, who organised a demonstration in response to his declaration in Najab last Sunday, deny that claim. Bearing Iraqi flags and signs , they demanded an end to the occupation and renunciation of the building of US army bases in Iraq, which they referred to as "the hidden occupation". Cities north and west of Baghdad, too, have been besieged for weeks now.
