Mowaffak Al-Rubaie - The Political Establishment

The Political Establishment

Active in shaping Iraq's post war political landscape right at the outset from the Nassariyeh Conference of 15 April 2003, Al Rubaie was appointed a member of the Iraqi Governing Council in July 2003 and served until its dissolution one year later. His negotiating skills and impartiality in dealing with Iraq's challenges were identified by all sides and he was appointed as Iraq's National Security Advisor (NSA) in April 2004 by the Coalition Provisional Authority. Al Rubaie was instrumental in forging and executing Government policy by using the National Security Council as the mechanism to influence and direct the various Iraqi ministries. He worked closely with Ali Allawi, then Minister Of Trade, in assisting Iraq's Accountability & Justice Commission in identfying the culprits behind the looting of the Ministry of Defense budget under Iyad Allawi's interim administration in 2005. He also served as the Iraqi Government's lead negotiator in the standoff with Syed Muqtada al-Sadr in Najaf in the summer of 2005 as well as representing Iraq on the international stage at international conferences and meetings with world leaders to rehabilitate Iraq's international standing.

By all accounts, no single person in the formative years of Iraq's nascent democracy had as much impact as Al Rubaie did in legitimising the new political reality of Iraq in the eyes of the dismissive Arab media and regimes whose natural instinct was to reject the new political order out of fear of the unfamiliar. Indeed, Saudia Arabia rejected overtures from both Ibrahim al-Jaafari in 2006 and his successor in 2008 in preference for dealing with Al Rubaie. Al Rubaie was the candidate of choice in Iraq's negotiations with the rest of the Arab League, Iran and Nato.