United Iraq will secure interests of all groups

Hadi Shoushtari made the statement in an exclusive interview with ˈIran Dailyˈ published Sunday.

“The interests of regional countries and Iraqi groups including Shias, Sunnis, Kurds and others depend on maintaining Iraq’s unity and integrity,” Shoushtari added.

The MP believed the “Iraqi people and top religious authority can settle all problems facing the country” and that they do not need foreign intervention to push the terrorists of the ISIL Takfiri group out of Iraq.

Shoushtari, who is a member of Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said Tehran attaches great importance to developments in Iraq because it is one of most important neighbors of Iran.

He warned that ISIL, which is an Al-Qaeda offshoot, poses a security threat to the territorial integrity of Iraq.

Noting that Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) is a semi-autonomous region in northern Iraq, he said “keeping this condition is in favor of all Iraqis”.

“Earlier some Kurdish officials had said something about the independence (of the Kurdish region from Iraq), but they abandoned their positions in view of the reactions to the comments,” the lawmaker said.

He also praised a call to arms issued by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in the face of the ISIL insurgency in the country. The call came as the Takfiri militants widened their grip in the north and east and threatened to march south, toward Baghdad.

Shoushtari added that the influence of Iraq’s top religious authority can defuse all plots against the country by its enemies.

Referring to the threats facing the country, he said that “another problem of Iraq was political that was settled with the election of president, parliament speaker and prime minister as well as the participation of all groups in power”.

The MP also welcomed the nomination of Haider al-Abadi as the next prime minister by that was made through convergence among Iraqi groups.

Since early this year, Iraq has been facing a growing militancy by the ISIL Takfiri group and its allied militants, who have taken over areas in the country’s west and north. The crisis has deteriorated since June, when the ISIL declared a so-called caliphate in the territories they have seized.

The ISIL terrorists have threatened all communities, including Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, Christians and Yazidi Kurds, in Iraq.

They have been committing heinous crimes in the areas they have taken, including the mass execution of civilians as well as Iraqi army troops and officers. The Iraqi army, backed by Kurdish forces and thousands of volunteers, is engaged in fierce fighting with the ISIL militants to drive them out of the captured areas.
/SR