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To the Editor

Letters will only be considered if they carry the writer's full name, address and telephone number (if any). The identity of the writers will be protected. Letters must be limited to 300 words. All letters will be subject to editing.
Launch disaster
"I am not a person to quit. If I quit then who would work"? Akbar the shipping minister declared this to the Daily Star over a telephonic interview. (Dated 11th July). Bravo Mr. Akbar, what a responsible response it was!
Was that a comment coming from a veteran politician? I doubt it. If you were a reasonable person you would have quit before anyone starts asking questions about it. The number of dead bodies was enough to justify your action.
The government should really take it seriously, it is time to take
measures to prevent future disasters.
FoyedAhmed
Shamoli, Dhaka
Switzerland can serve as a model for multiethnic Iraq
Though the United States went to Iraq out of its own security concerns, the real beneficiary of Saddam's ouster will be the Iraqi people. And Iraq may be already on the way to become a freer society. Though sporadic attacks by renegade Saddam loyalists
continue, tentative steps have already been taken toward a more representative form of government.
Last week, the Interim City Advisory Council opened up for business in Baghdad. L.Paul Bremer, the U.S, administrator in Iraq, called the meeting "perhaps the most important day for Baghdad since April 9, when coalition forces liberated (Baghdad)". Khaled Basher Mirza, the council chairman, called it as "a symbol of law and order that we all crave." The advisory council is the product of 88 local councils formed throughout the capital to stop
looting and general breakdown of law and order following the collapse oftheBaathistregime.
Despite threats by Saddam's heavily armed flunkies, more and more Iraqis are showing up for the meetings. Another City Council in the southern Shiite city of Najaf also began its deliberations by the end of the first week of July. These and other advisory councils are the precursors to elected city councils after a nation-wide referendum to be held on an Iraqi constitution in a few months. Iraq's first governing council is expected to take shape bymid-July.
As Iraq is looking for a viable representative government where conflicting interest of various ethnic and religious groups can be reconciled, Switzerland can serve as a model. The majority of Swiss are German-speaking, one third are French-speaking and a smaller group are Italian-speaking. While the Germans, the French and the Italians elsewhere in Europe were embroiled in conflict and war, different ethnic and religious groups in Switzerland have been living in peace and harmony. The Swiss achieved this by allowing different ethnic and religious groups to be largely self-governing
in their local areas. The cantons (regions) and towns and cities (communes) have most of the administrative powers, leaving the central government with defence, foreign relations and taxation and broader financial powers.
The same system could work in Iraq. In Iraq, the Shiite Arabs are more than 60 per cent of the population. And yet, Saddam and his minority Sunni Arabs ruled the Shiite majority through brute force. As such, it would be natural that the Shiites take their rightful place in the society. But care must be taken so that the Sunni minority are not left out in the new system.
The Kurdish minority are also Sunni, but they have a distinct language and culture and they were saved from total extermination by Saddam through U.S.-imposed "no-fly" zone after the end of the First Gulf War in 1991. Since then the Kurds have been largely successful in setting up rudimentary system of self-government in their areas under the allied protection. The same can be expanded in the Shiite and Sunni areas. Using the Swiss model, three main Iraqi groups — Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds — can set up their own cantons and communes, leaving the federal
government with residual powers to deal with defence, foreign relations and taxation and national economic policies.
However, attacks by heavily armed Saddam loyalists will remain the greatest threat. These armed henchmen of the old regime must be thinking that if they could create enough coalition military casualties, the Americans might cut short their military and security presence in Iraq, allowing them to take over the country again. This must not be allowed to happen.
Mahmood Elahi
Iris Street, Ottawa, Canada