9.4 |
June 2005 to May 2006
27.
The Committee
Chair, Sheikh Hummam Hammoudi, had indicated that a
further
13 places
might be allocated to Sunni members, but there remained pressure
to
increase
this number.
28.
Mr Patey
wrote that he was “encouraging the Sunnis to be realistic in
their
demands”,
taking into account that they made up around 20 percent of the
Iraqi
population.
He suggested that “they cannot expect to achieve much more than
parity
with the
Kurds”, who also accounted for about 20 percent of Iraq’s
population.
29.
Mr Patey
also reported that the Committee had been “won over” to the idea
of
practical
help from the UN and international community.
30.
Mr Chaplin
told the Inquiry that the UK lobbied Iraqi politicians on the need
to
ensure an
adequate number of credible Sunni figures in the
Committee.9
31.
Mr Patey
told the Inquiry that the UK also spent a lot of time trying to
convince
the TNA and
Shia politicians that de-Ba’athification had gone too far, and that
the
de‑Ba’athification
provisions should be excluded from the
Constitution.10
32.
Mr Blair
and President Bush spoke by video conference on 15
June.11
Mr Blair
said
that the
main issue was “making sure Sunni outreach went ahead in the right
way”;
it would
be important to draw them into what was still a “very fragile”
political process.
33.
In discussion
of plans for future speeches, Mr Blair suggested that it would
become
increasingly
important to “flesh out” plans for transition to Iraqi leadership
on security,
and the
drawdown of troops that would follow. By the elections in December,
“the
moderates
in Iraq would need to be able to show that things were
changing”.
34.
Dr John Reid,
the Defence Secretary, circulated a paper on the options for
future
UK force
posture in Iraq to the Defence and Overseas Policy Committee (Iraq)
(DOP(I))
35.
Dr Reid
explained that the existing policy position, which he did not see a
reason to
change, was
that the UK should not:
•
agree to
any changes to the UK area of responsibility;
•
agree to
any significant deployments outside MND(SE); or
•
agree to
any significant increase in the roughly 8,500 UK service
personnel
currently
deployed in Iraq.
36.
Dr Reid noted
that there was a “clear UK military aspiration” to transfer
security
responsibilities
to Iraqi forces in Muthanna and Maysan in October 2005, with
the
9
Public
hearing, 7 December 2009, page 21.
10
Public
hearing, 5 January 2010, page 6.
11 Letter
Quarrey to Siddiq, 15 June 2005, ‘Prime Minister’s VTC with
President Bush: Iraq, MEPP and the
UN’.
12
Paper Reid,
14 June 2005, ‘Options for future UK force posture in
Iraq’.
493