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Iraqi PM says Baghdad conducts 60 pct of sorties against IS, asks again Turkish troops to leave

Xinhua, January 9, 2016 Adjust font size:

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on Saturday said that more than 60 percent of sorties in the battles against the Islamic State (IS) militant group were carried out by the Iraqi air force conducted.

In his speech at the ceremony of 94th anniversary of the Police Day, Abadi said "during the last year, Iraqi air force fought Daesh (IS group in Arabic) and our pilots risked their lives, and I can say that maybe 60 percent of the sorties have been conducted by the Iraqi air force, but still about 40 percent of the sorties we need the coalition (led by Washington) aircraft to cooperate with us."

Abadi's comments came after the Iraqi security forces made a significant success late in December when the troops recaptured the city of Ramadi, the capital of Iraq's largest province of Anbar from the hands of IS militants.

Abadi also said that Iraq still needs foreign assistance for armament, training and air cover, but not presence of foreign troops, renewing his call for neighboring Turkey to withdraw its troops from northern Iraq.

"Daesh seizes part of the Iraqi land, but that does not give justification to any state to violate Iraq's sovereignty. These states have to stand with us not against us. They have to help us (in fighting against IS) not hamper us," Abadi told the ceremony broadcast live on the state-run Iraqiya television.

"This is a frank invitation to our neighbor Turkey to withdraw its forces from Iraq, and we won't allow any Turkish forces on the Iraqi land for whatever reason," Abadi said. "We will exert every effort within the international law to make them leave," he added.

The crisis between the two countries flared up in early December when Turkey deployed reinforcement troops equipped with armored vehicles to a training camp in Bashiqa area near the city of Mosul, and claimed the deployment was to train Sunni and Kurdish paramilitary fighters to battle the IS under a bilateral agreement.

Mosul, the capital of Nineveh province, has been under IS control since June 2014.

Baghdad has insisted that the Turkish troops had no authorization from the Iraqi government and thus demanded their withdrawal, while Ankara called the troops only a routine rotation of the trainers. Endit