Reconciling Iraq’s factions part of a boosted U.N. role

The Security Council voted unanimously Friday to expand the U.N. presence in Iraq to help tackle political, economic and humanitarian problems that have eluded the U.S., British and Iraqi governments.

The resolution directs the United Nations to help reconcile rival factions and to mediate territorial disputes, such as in the Kurdish north, where a referendum is pending on the future of the oil-rich region around Kirkuk.

The U.N. mission also should promote talks with Iraq’s neighbors on border security and refugee issues, and rally international support for rebuilding the country, the resolution says.

The United States and Britain, which have the largest military forces in Iraq and co-sponsored the resolution, have been pushing the world body to do more there because they believe the U.N. is perceived as more neutral and can approach ethnic and religious leaders that they cannot.

“The U.N. has an impartiality; it can talk to people and work with all the parties,” said British Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry. “We want to see conditions for the U.N. to be in a position to do more.”

Specifically, the U.S. and Britain envision a series of U.N.- brokered talks with competing groups within Iraq, as well as meetings with Iraq’s neighbors. They would be under U.N. auspices, but with the blessing of the Iraqi government and the backing of the U.S. and Britain -- the powers that can guarantee the implementation of the outcome.

Spokesmen for Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s Islamic Dawa Party and a key Shiite Muslim faction, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, welcomed expanding the role of the U.N., as long as it does not interfere with the Iraqi government’s decisions.

The resolution says the world body’s role should be expanded “as circumstances permit” -- an important concession to the security-conscious U.N., which has kept only 65 staffers in Iraq since a 2003 bombing of its Baghdad headquarters. But even with a skeleton staff, the U.N. has helped set up an interim government, draft the constitution, organize elections and channel aid through a larger headquarters in Jordan.

The previous U.N. secretary-general, Kofi Annan, resisted greater involvement because he thought it put both the organization’s staff and integrity at risk by appearing to support an invasion that the world body refused to back.

The new secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon, has been receptive to U.S. overtures to broaden the U.N. role in Iraq, though some critics worry that the U.S. and Britain are trying to hand off problems they can’t solve -- or even pave the way for an early withdrawal.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad reassured the Security Council that the U.S. would “continue to shoulder all of its responsibilities to assist Iraq’s government and people.”

Britain’s ambassador echoed the pledge.

“There is no question of handing over responsibilities or passing the buck,” Jones Parry said. “What we’re trying to do is intensify all the efforts being made -- that means all of us have to work harder.”

The move comes amid growing frustration in the Bush administration over its inability to quell violence or get Iraq’s neighbors to play the kind of constructive role U.S. officials have hoped for. Khalilzad implicitly blasted Saudi Arabia in comments last month for not keeping insurgents from crossing its border into Iraq, and two recent face-to-face meetings between U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker and his Iranian counterpart have not yielded tangible results.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates traveled to the Middle East last week to try to win support from Iraq’s neighbors, but came away largely empty-handed.

“Without a doubt, we in the international community have had our differences with regard to Iraq,” Khalilzad told the Security Council after the vote. “Despite these differences, I believe we all share the same vision for Iraq’s future,” he said, calling the unanimous adoption of the resolution “an important signal that the page has turned.”

The Iraqi government delayed the vote on the resolution by a day to ensure that the measure specified that the U.N. must have Baghdad’s permission for its mediation efforts so it won’t undermine the government’s power.

Iraqi officials and religious leaders gave a cautious welcome to the news of greater U.N. involvement. Shiite and Kurdish officials have long been wary, fearing that greater international participation could be used by Iraq’s Sunni Arabs and neighboring Arab states to take power away from them. In the spring of 2004, Shiites were initially leery of U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who had been sent to help broker the transition from occupation to sovereignty.

A member of Maliki’s Islamic Dawa Party said Iraq was eager to have greater U.N. involvement as long as the mission respected the government’s primacy.

“We welcome the supporting role that the U.N. will assume regarding reconciliation,” Kamal Suadi said. “However, we are against any side that is thinking to interfere with amending the constitution. We welcome any participation providing that there is no interference.”

He emphasized Iraq had been consulted before the decision.

In the Shiite shrine city of Najaf, cleric Sadruddin Qubanchi, an official of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council party, announced in his weekly sermon that the vote to expand the U.N. presence in Iraq “was important” and said he supported it as long as the United Nations respected Iraq’s decisions.

maggie.farley@latimes.com

Special correspondent Saad Fakhrildeen in Najaf and Times staff writer Saif Hameed in Baghdad contributed to this report.