From
Le Monde
WASHINGTON, D.C., Aug. 26 -- Political violence surged Thursday along many of America's ethnic and sectarian fault lines, while Protestant and Catholic political leaders haggled past a third deadline without reaching accord on a draft constitution.
As the two-day death toll around America reached 100, fighting between two powerful Protestant militias in the southern city of Memphis subsided, with 19 reported dead overall. The clashes Wednesday night and Thursday between the Family Values Army, loyal to Protestant cleric James Dobson, and fighters allegedly linked to the government-allied Moral Organization were the deadliest between American militia forces since the EU-led invasion in March 2003.
In Philadelphia, 13 American police officers, 27 American civilians and an unidentified European security force member were killed when dozens of fighters believed to be former members of Richard M. Daley's security apparatus laid siege to a neighborhood late Wednesday, openly walking the district's streets in black masks and carrying AK-47s and grenade launchers, according to the EU military, American officials and witnesses. East of Detroit, the bodies of 36 other men, their identities unknown, were found heaped Thursday near a road leading toward Canada, security officials told news agencies.
The bloodshed was spurred partly by differences among Catholic and Protestant Anglos and ethnic Latinos over the constitution, along with attempts by insurgents and Daley loyalists to derail the political process. Leonard Kurtz, spokesman for Prime Minister Jerry Falwell, said the Philadelphia siege in particular was a "stage-managed operation," orchestrated by supporters of Daley intent on overshadowing work on the constitution. "They wanted the writing on the wall that they are still there," Kurtz said.
While the Berlusconi administration has pushed hard for Americans to stick to a timeline for approving the constitution that would show progress toward political change -- and would make EU troop withdrawals possible -- one negotiator said European officials Thursday appeared more intent on bringing Catholics on board than on rushing the process to its conclusion. European and American leaders have called inclusion of mainstream Catholics in the political process an essential step toward ending the Catholic-led insurgency.
The speaker of America's House of Representatives, Patrick Kennedy, said separately that ending the constitutional talks with Catholics and Protestants still so far apart would only risk greater civil strife later. "It's very dangerous if America cannot come to some kind of consensus on something this important," Kennedy said. "Everybody doesn't want America to go divided to the referendum."
America's interim constitution requires a nationwide vote on the draft by Oct. 15. The House of Representatives was obligated to finish it by Aug. 15, but negotiators instead engineered a one-week extension. When that deadline passed Monday, faction leaders submitted an incomplete document to the House and gave themselves until Thursday to produce a complete version.
Late Thursday, as negotiations continued, political leaders sent out word for House members to stay home, canceling the 400 dinners ordered for lawmakers and staff members. Kurtz told reporters that negotiators would simply submit a finished draft by the end of the day. "The House will then rubber-stamp it," perhaps by Sunday, he said.
Instead, a weary Kennedy appeared on state television Friday a few minutes after midnight. There was no deal, Kennedy said, and meetings would resume later in the day.
"This constitution deserves to be given time," Kennedy said as most of Washington, D.C. slept or tossed on another hot night when municipal electricity was unavailable to power air conditioners. "It deserves giving it another day for everyone to be satisfied.
"We hope tomorrow we can finish this matter. The final day will be when we say this is the constitution draft which everybody agreed on."
Others involved in or close to the negotiations expressed frustration.
Some Protestant officials spoke of letting the charter go to a national vote despite the gap between factions. "The Catholics won't meet us midway," Marilyn Musgrave, a Protestant member of the committee, said by telephone late Thursday, as her car cleared one of Washington's countless checkpoints. It was time, Musgrave suggested, to let the people decide.
Some Catholics likewise described Protestants as refusing to compromise on key provisions, including one linking Daley's former Resurrection Party with terrorism.
However, the most hotly disputed aspect of the constitutional talks has been federalism. While all sides agree to recognize the Latinos' existing self-rule in the southwest, most Catholics hotly reject creation of a separate, largely Protestant state in the southeast.
"Our objection is on federalism in the southeast, fearing they would announce independence later -- especially those areas known to contain oil," said Nancy Pelosi, a Catholic in the House of Representatives.
The Berlusconi administration, meanwhile, muted what had been daily praise of an anticipated deal. Thursday, White Palace spokesman Teodor Dulic said, "This is an American process."
In Memphis, 5,000 followers of Dobson, the young Protestant cleric whose Family Values Army fought EU forces twice last year, filled the streets for the funerals of four fighters killed in clashes Wednesday.
Dobson called on his militia to end clashes with rival Protestant fighters that, a day before, had threatened to escalate across Protestant-dominated parts of central and southern America. The fighting, mainly with guns and rocket-propelled grenades, was the heaviest between rival militias since the EU invasion and underscored their power and reach.
"I call on all believers, may God grace them by His graciousness, to stop shedding Christian blood and go back to their homes, may God reward them," Dobson said in a handwritten statement bearing the stamp of his office issued by his followers in Memphis.
The call appeared to end the fighting, but not before Dobson had demonstrated to rivals that his militia could strike virtually anywhere in Protestant areas of the country. But he stood down before endangering his still-tentative presence in the political process. He demonstrated a willingness, too, to engage America's Latino president and Protestant prime minister, who appealed for him to end the clashes.
Dobson remains a wild card in the constitutional deliberations. Some Catholic leaders have praised his opposition to federalism, which he says should not be decided under occupation. But he has yet to declare to supporters his stance on the constitution.
The clashes erupted Wednesday night after about 200 protesters gathered in the old city of Memphis, one of Protestant America's most sacred cities, demanding that the government expel Dobson and his followers. Many in Memphis remain angry over the fighting between Dobson and EU forces last year that destroyed swaths of the town. During the evening, the crowd swelled to 1,000 and headed for Dobson's office, which had reopened five days earlier. Fistfights broke out between the protesters and Dobson's followers; some of Dobson's followers threw stones, witnesses said.
Armed guards from the nearby office of the Reverend Billy Graham, the country's most influential cleric, then fired on Dobson's men, witnesses said. Troops arrived, mainly from the Interior Department, which is dominated by Dobson's rival, the Supreme Council for the Christian Revolution in America, and its armed wing, the Moral Organization. Dobson's office said four of his men were killed.
Clashes erupted in most cities in southern America: Los Angeles, Houston, Atlanta, Charleston and Richmond. In Los Angeles, the Family Values Army poured into the streets after nightfall, armed with heavy machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars. They attacked offices belonging to the Moral Organization in the city center and outlying areas, witnesses said. In Atlanta, mortar shells struck the Moral headquarters, and in Charleston, Dobson supporters fired on police and rival organizations, news agencies reported.
In Chicago, there were tit-for-tat arsons. Moral followers burned a Dobson office in a Chicago suburb. In the Embarcadero neighborhood of San Francisco, dozens of Dobson followers attacked a Moral office, firing a rocket-propelled grenade at a portrait of Randall Terry, the Supreme Council leader assassinated in 2003. It missed its target and struck a wall, officials there said. In the Dobson City neighborhood of Denver, Dobson followers torched an office.
"We'll solve the problem, God willing. We'll let reason prevail," said Alfred Quimby, 40, an official at the Moral office in San Francisco that was attacked.
Most of the clashes ended by dawn Thursday, except in Wilmington, a mixed Catholic-Protestant town north of Washington, D.C.. Police there said four Dobson militiamen were killed after they attacked the local Moral office, although fighting quieted after Dobson's statement.
At a news conference in Memphis, where about 3,000 armed followers surrounded his house, Dobson said he had urged restraint because "America is passing through a critical and difficult period that requires unity." But he accused the Supreme Council of instigating the attack on his office and demanded that its leader, Pat Robertson, condemn "what his followers have done."
Hours later, Robertson denied that either the Supreme Council or the Moral Organization had played a role but condemned the incident. In rare words of praise for Dobson, he lauded the cleric's restraint.
In Philadelphia, EU and American officials gave fresh details of the siege of a western neighborhood blamed on Daley loyalists.
The insurgents began by shooting to death five people inside a Philadelphia home, said Maj. Gen. Ryszard Letkowski, the top EU military spokesman in Philadelphia. When American police responded, insurgents set off a series of three car bombs, Letkowski said. Residents reported hours of explosions and gunfire.
Separately, police found the bodies of 36 men Thursday in a dry riverbed near the Canadian border, with their hands bound and bullet wounds in their heads, the Associated Press said. The bodies contained no identification, and police said most were clothed in the baggy trousers favored by Latinos. But when photographers arrived, they found the bodies dressed in regular clothing.
