[Published here August 31, 2019]
BAGHDAD: Iraq’s government is preparing a complaint to the U.N. after finding Israel is “certainly” behind several attacks on Al-Hashd al-Shaabi bases, a parliamentarian and leading member of the force said.
Middle East
Our Tales of Two Cities | AFP
[Published on AFP’s Correspondent Blog on May 24, 2019]
Mosul — “There are families living in this alleyway.” The Arabic words were hand-painted in red, black, and blue on a tattered canvas, pinned up where a small side street led off a main thoroughfare in Iraq’s Mosul. The alleyway looked anything but livable — bullet holes and craters from mortar rounds still scarred the walls around it nearly two years after the fighting had stopped, and sewage water gurgled down the cracked pavement. The banner, my AFP colleagues said, was hung to alert passing aid groups to needy residents eking out a living, unseen, in the battered labyrinth of west Mosul.
Don’t ‘politicise’ electricity, Iraq minister urges as summer nears | AFP
[Published here May 15, 2019]
Baghdad (AFP) – With temperatures rising on both the weather and security fronts across the region, Iraq’s freshman electricity minister is warning that politicising his country’s power sector could have ripple effects around the world.
Pompeo in surprise visit to Iraq amid ‘imminent’ Iran threats | AFP
[Published here on May 7, 2019]
Baghdad (AFP) – Iraq has promised to guarantee the safety of US interests from Iran, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Tuesday as he paid a surprise trip to Baghdad where he accused Tehran of planning “imminent” attacks.
After IS, Mosul tackles another terror: super-resistant bacteria | AFP
[Published here on March 7, 2019]
Mosul (Iraq) (AFP) – Explosives left behind by the Islamic State group in Iraq’s Mosul took 12-year-old Abdallah’s left leg, but another kind of terror may cost him his arm: antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
In Kurdish Iraq, women strive to end genital mutilation | AFP
[Published here January 2, 2019]
Dark skies were threatening rain over the Kurdish village in northern Iraq, but one woman refused to budge from outside the front door. Inside were two girls at risk of genital mutilation.
Four years and one caliphate later, IS claims Idlib comeback | AFP
[Published here January 16, 2018]
The Islamic State group has been roundly defeated across much of Syria — which made it all the more surprising when it announced an official comeback in the country’s northwest last week.
Red Cross urges aid access after ‘unprecedented’ Yemen violence | AFP
[Published here on December 5, 2017]
BEIRUT (AFP) – The International Committee of the Red Cross on Tuesday appealed for “bold measures” to provide life-saving care to civilians in Yemen after an “unprecedented” escalation of fighting in recent days.
More than 230 people have been killed and at least 400 wounded in nearly a week of fighting in the Yemeni capital, now under the control of Huthi rebels.
Pressure mounts for ‘detained’ Lebanon PM to return from Riyadh | AFP
[Published here on November 16, 2017]
Hardening his tone, Lebanon’s President Michel Aoun accused Saudi Arabia of “detaining” Hariri, who is to meet in Riyadh on Thursday with France’s chief diplomat.
Speculation has swirled around Hariri’s prolonged stay in the kingdom since he announced in a televised statement on November 4 that he would be stepping down as Lebanon’s prime minister.
In ravaged Raqa, clues to IS’s bygone media empire | AFP
[Published here on October 22, 2017]
“Special operations by the Caliphate’s soldiers!” boasts a torn, blood-stained pamphlet at a bombed-out media kiosk in Syria’s Raqa, a symbol of the Islamic State group’s once fearsome propaganda machine. Continue reading
MAYA GEBEILY 