IRBIL, Iraq: An influential Iraqi Shiite cleric plans to visit the United Arab Emirates on Sunday, strengthening his ties with Sunni-ruled states of the Middle East.
It will be the second such trip in as many months for Moqtada Al-Sadr, who commands a large following among Iraq’s urban poor. He visited Saudi Arabia at the end of July.
The Emirati government will send a special plane to fly Sadr to the UAE and return him to Iraq, according to a statement on the cleric’s website.
The cleric is one of few Iraqi Shiite leaders to keep some distance from Shiite Iran, the main backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad. In April, Sadr called on Assad to “take a historic heroic decision” and step down, to spare his country further bloodshed.
Sadr’s office said his meetings last month with the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, resulted in an agreement to study possible investments in Shiite regions of southern Iraq. The Saudis will also consider the possibility of opening a consulate in Iraq’s holy Shiite city of Najaf, he said.
Sadr also announced a Saudi decision to donate $10 million to help Iraqis displaced by the war on Daesh in Iraq, to be paid to the Iraqi government.
Baghdad and Riyadh had announced in June they would set up a coordination council to upgrade ties, as part of an attempt to heal troubled relations between the Arab neighbors.
Saudi Arabia reopened its embassy in Baghdad in 2015 following a 25-year break, and Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir made a rare visit to Baghdad in February.
(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli)
Iraq's Moqtada Al-Sadr visits UAE, strengthening ties with Sunni states
Iraq's Moqtada Al-Sadr visits UAE, strengthening ties with Sunni states
Take back and prosecute your jailed Daesh militants, Iraq tells Europe
RAQQA: Baghdad on Friday urged European states to repatriate and prosecute their citizens who fought for Daesh, and who are now being moved to Iraq from detention camps in Syria.
Europeans were among 150 Daesh prisoners transferred so far by the US military from Kurdish custody in Syria. They were among an estimated 7,000 militants due to be moved across the border to Iraq as the Kurdish-led force that has held them for years relinquishes swaths of territory to the advancing Syrian army.
In a telephone call on Friday with French President Emmanuel Macron, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani said European countries should take back and prosecute their nationals.
An Iraqi security official said the 150 so far transferred to Iraq were “all leaders of the Daesh group, and some of the most notorious criminals.” They included “Europeans, Asians, Arabs and Iraqis,” he said.
Another Iraqi security source said the group comprised “85 Iraqis and 65 others of various nationalities, including Europeans, Sudanese, Somalis, and people from the Caucasus region.”
They all took part in Daesh operations in Iraq, he said, and were now being held at a prison in Baghdad.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that “non-Iraqi terrorists will be in Iraq temporarily.”
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces jailed thousands of militant fighters and detained tens of thousands of their relatives in camps as it pushed out Daesh in 2019 after five years of fighting.
