Potential Setback For Sunni-Shi'a Reconciliation

October 2008 | Political Risk Alert

Today's (October 21) raid by Iraqi security forces on the home of Mullah Shihab al-Safi, provincial leader of the Sunni Awakening movement in Diyala province, could raise sectarian tensions. As yet, there is no word on the reasons for the raid in which Safi's brother and father were arrested, and indeed, it may have been quite legitimate. Nevertheless, now that the Shi'a-led government in Baghdad is becoming more assertive and its security forces more competent, minority Sunni communities could feel increasingly marginalised, and raids such as today's could infuse them with a general sense of

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