Iraq Govt Blamed for Rebel Advance

Prince Turki Al-Faisal

ARAB NEWS: ROME: Prince Turki Al-Faisal, a former intelligence chief, has blamed the Iraqi government of Nuri Al-Maliki for the loss of wide areas of northern Iraq to militants, saying Baghdad had failed to stop them joining forces with former Baathists from the Saddam Hussein era. He said the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) insurgency should have come as no surprise.

“The situation in the Anbar area of Iraq has been brewing and boiling for some time and the Iraqi government seemed to be not only inactive in putting down the boiling temperature there but also in some cases seem to have been encouraging events there to spill over,” he told a meeting of the European Council on Foreign Relations in Rome. » | Agencies | Saturday, June 14, 2014