Shia deployment after major defeat
Iraqi forces to regroup after militants overrun Ramadi
SHIA paramilitaries were preparing to deploy to Iraq’s western province of Anbar yesterday after Islamic State militants overran the provincial capital, Ramadi, in the biggest defeat for the Baghdad government since last year.
The US-led coalition stepped up air raids against the Islamists, conducting 19 strikes in the vicinity of Ramadi over the past 72 hours at the request of the Iraqi security forces, a coalition spokesman said.
A spokesman for the paramilitaries, which are known as Hashid Shaabi, said they had received orders to mobilise, but details could not be revealed for security reasons. “Now that the Hashid has received the order to march forward, they will definitely take part,” said Ali al-Sarai, a member of the Hashid Shaabi’s media wing. “They were waiting for this order and now they have it.”
Ramadi is dominated by Sunni Muslims. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi signed off on the deployment of Shia militias to try to seize back the area, a move he had previously resisted for fear of provoking a sectarian backlash.
About 500 people have been killed in the fighting for Ramadi in recent days and between 6 000 and 8 000 have fled, a spokesman for the provincial governor said.
The city’s fall marked a major setback for the forces ranged against Islamic State: the US-led coalition and the Iraqi security forces, which have been propped up by Iranian-backed Shia militias
It was also a harsh return to reality for Washington, which at the weekend had mounted a successful special forces raid in Syria in which it said it killed an Islamic State leader in charge of the group’s black market oil and gas sales, and captured his wife.
While the Iraqi government and Shia paramilitaries recaptured the city of Tikrit from Islamic State last month, the major northern city of Mosul remains under the control of the Islamists.
Islamic State said it had seized tanks in Ramadi and killed dozens of “apostates”, its description for members of the Iraqi security forces.
Earlier, security sources said government forces had evacuated a military base after it came under attack by the insurgents, who had already taken one of the last districts still holding out.
It was the biggest victory for Islamic State in Iraq since security forces and Shia paramilitary groups began pushing the militants back last year, aided by air strikes from a US-led coalition.
While the government in Baghdad has urged Sunni tribes in Anbar to accept help from Shia militia against Islamic State, many Sunnis regard the Shia fighters with deep hostility. Islamic State portrays itself as a defender of Sunnis against the Iran-backed Shia fighters.