Hardships leave Iraqis numb to UN resolution

BAGHDAD - The UN Security Council resolution formally ending the occupation of Iraq drew few cheers in Baghdad, where sceptical people consumed by security fears and economic hardship said they knew nothing about it.

"Is the resolution going to give us electricity or water? I doubt it," Eman Abdullah, a 30-year-old policewoman, said on Wednesday. "We are not involved in any decisions anyway. We are just pawns."

The UN Security Council voted unanimously on Tuesday to adopt a U.S.-British resolution which formally ends the occupation of Iraq on June 30, passing sovereignty back to Iraqi authorities while allowing US and coalition troops to stay.

While the Security Council voted 15-0 in favour, ordinary people in Iraq feel excluded from the postwar political process, which is heavily influenced by the United States and which led to the formation of an interim Iraqi government last week.

Some Iraqis say they do not bother following events at the United Nations, which imposed crippling sanctions on Iraq for 13 years following Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and is not highly regarded by Iraqis.

"What resolution? Anyway we will not have full sovereignty," said Lubna Hassan, a housewife standing near the former UN headquarters in Baghdad, which was blown up by a suicide truck bomb last year, killing the UN envoy and 21 others.

That pessimism was echoed in the sacred Shi'ite city of Kerbala, where militiamen loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have challenged US troops.

"This resolution will not stop the violence because it will not give Iraqis full sovereignty," said Adel Abdel Hashim, a university professor.

While many expressed ambivalence at the resolution, Kurdish leaders are alarmed, saying it did nothing to recognise the autonomy granted to the Kurds in three provinces of northern Iraq in the interim constitution signed in March.

Kurdish politicians said they would quit the new Iraqi government over the issue, if called upon by leaders to do so.

The resolution also gives the Iraqi interim government the right to order US troops to leave at any time and makes clear the mandate of the international force will expire by the end of January 2006.

"We hope it's not ignored because it'll give us complete sovereignty," said Abdullah Abdul-Latif, a 40-year-old bead seller in the fiercely anti-American town of Falluja.

Many Iraqis are caught in a cycle of resentment for the occupation and fears that a US departure will escalate bloodshed in a country with volatile sects vying for power.

In the blistering heat, 19-year-old watermelon seller Allawi Kathim said he hoped business will improve but stood ready to join forces with Sadr's militiamen to fight US troops.

Kathim has not heard of the UN resolution but he knows the challenges and frustrations facing Iraq and acknowledged that if US forces left, greater violence among Iraqis would occur.

"I fought the Americans and will fight again. But they killed a lot of us in fighting in Najaf and Kerbala. If they leave, we Iraqis will eat each other up," he said.

It seems Iraq's almost daily nightmare of bombings and clashes have left many people suspicious, even of a UN resolution that formally ends the occupation and promises to help with the country's first elections in 2005.

Sitting in his ambulance in heavy traffic, driver Elias Khidir was quick to condemn the resolution.

"I reject it. It allows for the state of Iraq to give away Iraqi citizenships to foreigners, even the Jews," he said of a subject not mentioned in the resolution.