LONDON, March 20 (UPI) -- Iraq is not in a state of civil war, nor is such a situation inevitable, British Defense Secretary John Reid insisted Monday.
Speaking on the third anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Reid acknowledged the rise in sectarian violence since last month's attack on Samarra's Askariya mosque, one of Shiite Islam's holiest sites, but said there had been "significant progress" by the Iraqi people in building and defending their democracy.
"The situation in Iraq is serious but it is not terminal," he said. "There has been an increase in sectarian violence but it is not a civil war."
His assessment contrasts with that of the former interim Iraqi prime minister, Iyad Allawi, who told the Times of London last week that the country was "practically in stage one of a civil war as we speak."
Reid told journalists at London's Foreign Press Association: "There is not a civil war in the north, there is not a civil war in the south, and even in many provinces in the center there are not the civilian tensions with the range, the spread, the sustainability that you could call a civil war."
"It is not imminent and there is certainly nothing inevitable about a slide towards civil war," he insisted.
Reid said there had been a "systematic attempt" by international terrorists to provoke a civil war between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.
"No one should disguise the difficulties and dangers that there are, and in some areas are actually growing," he continued. It was a "tactical, operational and strategic objective" of terrorists in Iraq to spark such a war through "cruel and barbarous terrorist attacks."
But, setting the conflict against a definition that is likely to be questioned by some analysts, Reid said the current situation did not have the characteristics of the civil strife under Saddam Hussein's leadership.
"The Iraqi leadership of today does not have Saddam's evil tactics of dividing brother from brother, pitting family against family," he said. "They do not deploy as their tactic the systematic disintegration of Iraqi society. That was a civil war, when Saddam gassed thousands of Kurdish men and women from the inside out with chemical weapons, and the attempted genocide of Marsh Arabs in the south.
"That is the nature of a civil war, and there is not a remote possibility that any of the Iraqi political leaders would adopt that as a tactic at the present time."
The current violence had been precipitated by a "specific and calculated act of barbarism" in the bombing of the Samarra shrine, Reid continued, and had been fuelled by the vacuum of a stalled political process.
"Terrorists love a political vacuum, so the formation of a government of national unity is today more urgent than ever," he stressed.
It was now imperative that the elected Iraqi parliament speedily form a government that united politicians of all ethnic groups and denominations, he said, "to respond to the terrorists' latest attempts to divide them, by uniting."
If there was a risk of civil war, it was that Iraq unravel from the top down, he said, which he did not believe was likely.
Reid said he believed that a "balanced political solution" was emerging from the current negotiations in Baghdad, but stressed that any government must ensure that ministers were non-sectarian and that whoever became prime minister must govern in a consultative and collective manner.
His comments followed the agreement of Iraqi leaders Sunday to form council of representatives from the country's main political factions to set government policy on security and economic matters.
The 19-member council would include the president and prime minister, yet to be decided, and would have more power than the cabinet.
Iraqi politicians said the council, aimed at stemming sectarian tensions, would increase Sunni representation and prevent decisions from being taken behind closed doors. But critics have raised concerns that the make-up of the council, based on the level of representation of each political grouping in the parliament, would still give Shiites representatives the power to effectively veto any decision.
The agreement is the first breakthrough in talks aimed at forming a national government following last December's parliamentary elections. It comes amid deadlock over other issues, such as which groups will control key ministries. The powerful Shiite bloc is determined to retain control of the Ministry of the Interior, which many Sunnis blame for a wave of sectarian killings by associated militia groups and the Shiite-dominated police force. A report earlier this month by human rights group Amnesty International said abuse and torture was rife at detention facilities controlled by the Ministry of the Interior.
Reid acknowledged such difficulties, saying sectarian killings were on the rise and that mixed loyalties persisted within the police force.
"There must be no place in the new Iraq for armed gangs usurping the use of force to create no go areas," he said, adding that any incorporation of militia members into the police force had to be on the government's terms.
So far, however, any progress in eradicating sectarianism from the security services has been difficult to detect, particularly amid the wave of violence currently engulfing the country.
The third anniversary of the invasion was marred by at least two roadside bombings, killing at least eight people in the town of Musayyib, south of Baghdad, and the neighborhood of Karrada in the capital.
Elsewhere, at least nine other bodies were found showing signs of torture, suspected victims of sectarian attacks.
To those whose lives are destroyed by such attacks, disputes over whether or not the situation meets the definition of a civil war are surely irrelevant.
