WORRISOME WARRANTS AND OTHER TALES FROM BABIL

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 HILLAH 000013

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 1/22/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM SOCI PTER KDEM IZ
SUBJECT: WORRISOME WARRANTS AND OTHER TALES FROM BABIL

HILLAH 00000013 001.2 OF 002


CLASSIFIED BY: Charles F. Hunter, Babil PRT Leader, REO
Al-Hillah, Department of State.
REASON: 1.4 (b),(d)




1. (U) This is a Babil PRT cable.


2. (C) Summary: Two cases involving a total of fifteen warrants
issued in Karbala for Sunni citizens of Babil have the
provincial police chief and chief justice worried that
extradition may serve as cover for nefarious sectarian or
anti-Ba'athist ends. One of the supposedly wanted men enjoys
parliamentary immunity as a member of the Council of
Representatives. In an unrelated case, a Sadrist official
threatened that Jaysh Al-Mahdi (JAM) would "take over" Al-Hillah
if five JAM kidnappers were not released from custody. It would
be premature to say that the rule of law is under direct attack
in Babil, but these developments certainly bear watching. End
summary.

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FIVE FISHY WARRANTS~
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3. (C) Early in January 2007, Babil Police Chief MG Qais Hamza
Abboud Al-Ma'mouri contacted Coalition Forces and the Babil PRT
to signal his concerns about arrest warrants he had received
from Karbala. Dated November 29, the five warrants had been
passed to Qais in December by Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Khabat, the
Babil representative of the Minister of State for National
Security Affairs. The delivery channel was the first red flag
for Gen. Qais, as it did not conform to the three authorized
means of transmitting such documents between provinces: either
via the Ministry of Interior, from the issuing province's court
directly to the other province's police, or between the police
forces of the two provinces.


4. (C) The warrants' originator also struck Gen. Qais as out of
the ordinary. All of them were signed by Judge Muhammad Abbas
Shakeh, of the Ministry of Justice's Internal Affairs Department
in Karbala. This department in any province would ordinarily
deal with public-sector corruption cases, yet none of the wanted
men works for the government. Still another alarm went off for
Qais from the fact that all five are Sunnis and former
Ba'athists who reside in Babil, not Karbala. A former Air Force
general himself, Qais personally knows one of the men, a former
Army general named Basil Abbas Hamad Al-Sahhaf, and has no
reason to suspect that he has been involved in wrongdoing. The
other four are Nadib Ali Khalil Al-Sultani, a former Army
captain; Hatim 'Ubaid 'Ubais Al-Sultani, a former Army sergeant
major, and two civilian former Ba'athists, Musa Hassuni Salman
Al-Amidi and Karim Jabur Khedair Al-Nafi'e (NFI).


5. (C) Based on these three factors, Qais suspected that the
warrants, which themselves are apparently legitimate, could be
merely a cover for an attempt to eliminate these individuals on
sectarian or anti-Ba'athist grounds. His fear was grounded in
precedent: Qais cites a case when a Sunni former colonel from
Babil, after being extradited and having the charges quickly
dropped, was kidnapped outside the courthouse in Tuwairij (on
the Babil-Karbala border) immediately after being released from
custody.


6. (C) Despite his misgivings Qais took the first step legally
required of him, by submitting the warrants to the Babil court
for authentication. The Babil chief judge, A'ad Hatif Jabr,
shared Qais' suspicions but had no grounds or standing to delve
into the substance of the case. He and Qais agreed that they
should delay extradition and seek to have the case transferred
to Babil. But after calls came from the Ministry of Interior
and from an individual identifying himself as being from the
Prime Minister's office ordering the enforcement of the
warrants, the arrests were made and the men transported to
Karbala on January 11. (Note: The Babil police reported seizing
Kalashnikovs during at least one of these arrests. End note.)
The PRT's Rule of Law coordinator has been advised that an
attorney is working to have the case transferred to another
venue (NFI).

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THEN TEN MORE~
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7. (C) A more recent case followed a similar pattern: warrants
from Karbala (these dated November 9) for an all-Sunni group of
North Babil residents, ten in all, supposedly wanted for
carrying out sectarian kidnappings and killings. Among the
dubious elements in this iteration is the fact that one warrant
is for a sitting member of the Council of Representatives,
Hassan Daigan Khdeir of Al-Tawafuq (the Iraqi Accord Front),who
is one of Babil's two Sunni parliamentarians and in any event

HILLAH 00000013 002.2 OF 002


enjoys parliamentary immunity. Another is for former
Iskandariya police chief Ali Fakhri, whom the Ministry of
Interior compelled Gen. Qais to fire against his will earlier in
January. (Note: Qais asserts that sectarian killings of Sunnis
have increased noticeably around Iskandariya since the arrival
of the MOI-appointed local chief. End note.) The others are
laborers, a contractor, a photographer, and a police sergeant
major. Qais refused to submit the warrants for authentication
because he received only photocopies; with Judge A'ad's
concurrence, he has sent them back to Karbala with a request for
original documents.

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AND A THREATENED JUDGE
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8. (C) On January 16, Judge A'ad informed the PRT legal advisor
of an apparent case of intimidation against one of his judges.
Five people affiliated with Jaysh Al-Mahdi (JAM) had been
captured the previous week in the Al-Shawi neighborhood of
Al-Hillah after taking a hostage. Soon thereafter a
representative of the Office of the Martyr Sadr (OMS) came to
see Investigative Judge Nasser to demand the men's release so
that OMS could "deal with them themselves." If they weren't
turned over, he warned, JAM would "take over" the city. Nasser
stood his ground and the OMS official left. To date there has
been no indication of an attempt to implement the threat.

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COMMENT
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9. (C) Taken together, these three incidents are worrisome but
do not yet constitute a clear indication that the rule of law is
under direct attack in Babil. Gen. Qais and Judge A'ad are
understandably vigilant both on principle - law enforcement and
the judiciary must remain above any manipulation - and to
protect Babil province's hard-earned reputation for probity.
Though these two men often credit Coalition Forces and the PRT
for enabling them to withstand threats, including assassination
attempts, it is mostly out of personal courage and conviction
that they continue in their work. The PRT and our military
colleagues will continue to monitor these troubling cases and
support our interlocutors' efforts to serve and defend all
Babil's law-abiding citizens. End comment.
HUNTER