Iraq ponders amnesty for insurgents

BAGHDAD — Less than a week after taking power, Iraq’s prime minister is considering offering amnesty to insurgents and could extend it to those who killed American troops, in an apparent bid to lure Saddam Hussein’s loyalists from their campaign of violence.

A spokesman for Iyad Allawi went so far as to suggest attacks on U.S. troops over the past year were legitimate acts of resistance — a sign of the new government’s desire to distance itself from the 14-month U.S.-led occupation of Iraq.

“If [a guerrilla] was in opposition against the Americans, that will be justified because it was an occupation force,” the spokesman, Georges Sada, said yesterday. “We will give them freedom.”

Choking the brutal 14-month insurgency is the No. 1 priority of Mr. Allawi’s government, and the prime minister is expected to make a number of security-related policy announcements in coming days. They also include the resurrection of Iraq’s death penalty and an emergency law that sets curfews in Iraq’s trouble spots, Mr. Sada said.

The amnesty plan is still in the works. A full pardon for insurgents who killed Americans is not a certainty, Mr. Sada said. Mr. Allawi’s main goal is to “start everything from new” by giving a second chance to rebel fighters who hand in their weapons and throw their weight behind the new government.

“There is still heavy discussion about this,” said Mr. Sada, who was interviewed in the prime minister’s office. He said the U.S. Embassy has encouraged Mr. Allawi to try creative solutions to end the insurgency as long as they don’t infringe on human rights.

Analysts say Mr. Allawi’s plan is critical to ending a grinding rebellion in Iraq’s Sunni Muslim heartland that has shown no sign of bowing to the U.S. military. Especially worrisome for Mr. Allawi’s government is recent evidence that shows secular fighters — ex-members of Saddam’s Ba’ath Party — forming an alliance with radical Islamists.

Some type of amnesty is needed to coax Iraqi nationalist guerrillas to the government’s side, while separating them from fighters using terrorist-style bombings, specialists say.

“It’s hard to imagine any way forward other than co-opting people who had previously fought against the United States, either as part of Saddam’s army, part of the insurgency, or both,” said Jon Alterman, a Middle East specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “Allawi needs to split the opposition into two groups: those he can co-opt and those he must confront.”

Amnesties can be tricky. If the offer is too strict and few rebels accept, it will have little effect. But too lenient a deal could destabilize the government by bringing criminals and radicals into the government, said James Dobbins, a veteran diplomat who served as the Bush administration’s special envoy for Afghanistan.

Amnesties have succeeded in many countries. Militants once considered outlaws landed top jobs in government. In Kenya, South Africa and Cyprus, they even became presidents. Some were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

“Not to push the point too far, but George Washington led the American insurgency and went on to become our first president,” Mr. Dobbins said. “If Allawi and his government can’t assume the nationalist mantle in the eyes of the Iraqi population, they can’t prevail against the insurgency.”

Mr. Dobbins said he believed Washington would not block Mr. Allawi’s pardoning of Iraqi insurgents, noting that there is plenty of precedent for such reconciliation. The United States never sought to prosecute surrendering Germans, Koreans or Vietnamese who had killed U.S. soldiers. He said he doubted the United States intends to prosecute the many Afghan and Iraqi prisoners it holds as enemy combatants.

Moreover, there is wide acknowledgment that U.S. occupation chief L. Paul Bremer’s disbanding of Iraq’s army and security services was a mistake and forced people into fighting the occupation for money and revenge, Mr. Sada said.

“Some people were cheated, some were misled. Some did this because they had no salaries, no food, no bread,” he said.

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