ERBIL: Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani warned that despite victories in the war against Islamic State, the global coalition against the group was inadequate and predicted a campaign to retake the Iraqi city of Mosul would not happen before the fall.
In an interview with Reuters late on Thursday, Barzani said there was little chance of defeating the Jihadi movement so long as the civil war rages on in Syria, Iraq’s army continues to exist more on paper than on the ground, and Kurdish Peshmerga forces in northern Iraq remain woefully under-armed.
Current US strategy, says the prime minister of the self-ruling Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), will at best contain IS, a resilient and carefully structured organisation that will menace the region and the world for years to come.
The jihadi movement, which last year declared a cross-border caliphate after seizing tracts of territory in eastern Syria and west and northern Iraq, directly threatens the Iraqi Kurdish entity across front lines just 45 km (30 miles) from Erbil, the bustling capital of the KRG.
“This is a long war. They control more than 15 million people in Iraq and Syria,” said Barzani, 49, nephew of Kurdistan’s President Massoud Barzani. “IS has now been contained and controlled but it is still able to carry attacks.”
“They are organised and able to recruit people from all over the world. The structure of this organization has been set up in such a way that it will remain intact”.
The fight-back against Islamic State launched by a US-led coalition last year, relying on air strikes with no commitment of ground troops, will not dislodge the jihadis from strongholds such as Mosul, just 80 km (50 miles) from Erbil.
“With air strikes you cannot destroy this organization for sure,” he said. “To destroy this organization we need some special forces, not boots on the ground, but some joint military operations fighting alongside the peshmerga.”
He added: “The question is: is the policy one of containment, or to dislodge and destroy them?” said Barzani at his luxury residence in the capital. “In order to totally eradicate them, further action must be taken.”
Barzani said Kurds were fighting Islamic State for areas that rightfully belonged to the Kurdish region and would avoid using peshmerga fighters to drive Islamic State fighters from Sunni areas or retake Mosul.
“As Kurds we don’t want to spearhead any attack to retake Mosul. We want to avoid further conflict,” he said.
He emphasized that the timetable for such an offensive would depend on the rebuilding of the Iraqi army, which collapsed last summer as IS conquered Mosul and raced across northern Iraq.
“There is no real Iraqi army that can do the job. It needs time. We have to be realistic,” Barzani said.
Asked about plans touted by Iraqi and US officials for an offensive by June on Mosul, Barzani said: “March definitely not. June, also I doubt it”.
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