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Iraq will end up like Egypt or Syria, former British FM predicts

IRNA

London, Dec. 15, IRNA -- Iraq will not become a beacon of democracy 
in the Middle East as the US had hoped but end up like Egypt or Syria,
former British Foreign Secretary Sir Michael Rifkind predicts Monday. 
Rifkind, who also served as Defence Secretary, said that the 
capture of Saddam Hussein was not the beginning of the end but the 
"end of the beginning" and suggested that the US should use the 
opportunity to seek an even earlier departure from Iraq. 
"The end result of the second (Persian) Gulf war will not be a 
liberal, capitalist Iraq that is a beacon in the Middle East," he 
warned, predicting that it would be a "new, tough, authoritarian 
Iraqis" that will emerge to take over the levers of power." 
"If Iraq is lucky, it will end up like Egypt; if unlucky, it will 
be like Syria," the former Foreign Secretary said in an article for 
the Guardian newspaper. 
He said that however delighted the Iraqis might be to be relieved 
of Saddam`s tyranny, they feel "humiliated by foreign occupation and 
they should not be expected to be any less anti-American than the 
rest of the Arab world." 
"If the Americans ignore these sensitivities then the insurgents, 
with Saddam out of the way, will seem more like freedom fighters to 
ordinary Iraqis," Rifkind said. 
He suggested that if the US responded generously to the current 
events to justify an even earlier departure of occupying forces, "the 
dissidents will quickly lose any popular support. 
The former British Foreign Secretary also reminded US President 
George W Bush that his re-election year "depends on Americans feeling 
that they are not facing a new Vietnam" and that his boost in 
prestige would be short-lived if violence continues. 
HC/212 
End