Iraq says it captured senior Al Qaeda operative
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq said on Sunday it had arrested the second most senior figure in al Qaeda, "severely wounding" an organization the U.S. military says is intent on plunging the country into sectarian civil war.
The announcement came as talks between the United States and Iraq on transferring operational command of Iraq's forces to the Defense Ministry were deadlocked. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki was demanding more independence from the U.S. military.
Maliki was also at loggerheads with the leader of ethnic Kurds, who brandished the threat of secession in a growing row over the symbolic issue of flying the Iraqi national flag at government buildings in the autonomous Kurdish north.
Hours after an "embarrassed" U.S. military again postponed a ceremony to hand command of Iraqi troops to the government, the National Security Adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaie summoned reporters to a hastily arranged news conference to announce that al Qaeda leader Hamid Juma Faris al-Suaidi had been seized some days ago.
Read the rest at Reuters
The announcement came as talks between the United States and Iraq on transferring operational command of Iraq's forces to the Defense Ministry were deadlocked. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki was demanding more independence from the U.S. military.
Maliki was also at loggerheads with the leader of ethnic Kurds, who brandished the threat of secession in a growing row over the symbolic issue of flying the Iraqi national flag at government buildings in the autonomous Kurdish north.
Hours after an "embarrassed" U.S. military again postponed a ceremony to hand command of Iraqi troops to the government, the National Security Adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaie summoned reporters to a hastily arranged news conference to announce that al Qaeda leader Hamid Juma Faris al-Suaidi had been seized some days ago.
Read the rest at Reuters
posted by iraqnam at 11:04 AM
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