Rice to ask Saudi help in pacifying Iraqi Sunnis

MIDDLE EAST: US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice said yesterday during a stopover at Shannon en route to the Middle East that she plans to ask Saudi Arabia to use its influence with Iraqi Sunnis to persuade them to contribute to the stabilisation of Iraq.

But the Saudis have little leverage with Iraqi Sunnis, 70 per cent of whom now support the insurgency. Having adopted a strong stand against the 2003 US war and warned that toppling the Baathist regime would destabilise Iraq and its neighbours, Saudi Arabia has responded to rising violence next door by clamping down on domestic militants and investing $1.8 billion (€1.41 billion) to improve defences along its border with Iraq.

In spite of these efforts, Riyadh does not feel secure. Nawaf Obaid, a government adviser, said, "the feeling in Saudi is that Iraq is way out of control with no possibility of stability. The urgency now is to get that border sealed: physically sealed. . . If and when Iraq fragments there's going to be a lot of people heading south. . . we have to be prepared." Riyadh is therefore going ahead with construction of a $12 billion package of measures including a barrier along its 900km frontier with Iraq. The fence, consisting of two layers of concertina-wire mounted with electronic sensors and backed up by military bases, could take five to six years to construct.

On one hand, the barrier would prevent Saudi militants, who make up about a quarter of foreign fighters, from crossing into Iraq and taking part in the insurgency. Riyadh also seeks to halt the return of Saudi veterans of the Iraq conflict who could carry out attacks in the kingdom.

On the other hand, the Saudis fear that if Iraq erupts into full-scale civil war there could be a mass exodus of Iraqis into Saudi Arabia. Riyadh is determined, in particular, to prevent Iraqi Shias from seeking refuge in the Saudi Shia area of al-Hasa, the highly volatile oil-producing area. The Saudi Sunni establishment does not want an influx of Iraqi Shias because it already has serious problems with its own Shia minority which suffers discrimination at the hands of puritanical Wahhabi clerics who do not consider Shias to be Muslims. A spokesman for Iraq's Ministry of the Interior said that Iraq welcomed Riyadh's plans to improve border security.