Sunni militia strike could derail US strategy against al-Qaida

They are known to the US Army as CLC's - concerned local citizens - when, in fact, they are actually the people that the US is paying to fight al Qaeda at a local level.

However, that arrangement appears to be unraveling and the CLC's are threatening to go on strike, claiming that the US are failing to pay them.

Leading members of the 80,000-strong Sahwa, or awakening, councils have said they will stop fighting unless payment of their $10 a day (£5) wage is resumed. The fighters are accusing the US military of using them to clear al-Qaida militants from dangerous areas and then abandoning them. A telephone survey by GuardianFilms for Channel 4 News reveals that out of 49 Sahwa councils four with more than 1,400 men have already quit, 38 are threatening to go on strike and two already have.

These are the people that Bush, on the anniversary of the start of the Iraq war, hailed as being amongst the first Arabs to fight al Qaeda. But they are threatening to strike because they are Sunni's and the Shia government is failing to find jobs for them in the police and military and because, they say, the Americans have failed to pay them regularly for the work that they have been doing.

But dozens of phone calls to Sahwa leaders reveal bitterness and anger. "We know the Americans are using us to do their dirty work and kill off the resistance for them and then we get nothing for it," said Abu Abdul-Aziz, the head of the council in Abu Ghraib, where 500 men have already quit.

"The Americans got what they wanted. We purged al-Qaida for them and now people are saying why should we have any more deaths for the Americans. They have given us nothing."

In Dora, a southern suburb of Baghdad, the leaders of a Sahwa group of 2,400 men said they were considering strike action because none of the 2,000 applicants they had put forward for jobs with the police and military had been accepted.

The Shia-dominated government of Nouri al-Maliki has found jobs for only a handful of the Sahwa fighters.

"We need to get all the Sahwas in the country together and organise a national strike," said Ahah al-Zubadi, leader of 35 Sahwa councils, the largest group in Iraq. "When the areas started to cool down and the situation began to get better the Americans really cooled to us."

Surely the last thing the US needs is for these guys to turn against them? Why would the US be failing to pay these guys when their wage is a measly £5 a day?

This story simply makes no sense to me. But, the Guardian have telephoned the Sahwa councils and this is what they are being told. They are going to strike unless the US resumes payments to them.

How utterly bizarre.

Click title for full article.

Tags: Sahwa, awakening councils, Iraq war, Bush, al Qaeda, strike