Iraq will not be just a ‘spectator’ in Syria, prime minister says

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ANKARA (Reuters) – Iraq will not act as a mere spectator in Syria where it believes groups and sects are victims of ethnic cleansing, Iraq’s prime minister said on Tuesday, according to a readout from his office of a phone call to Turkey’s president.

Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, who discussed the situation in Syria with Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan, said Iraq would exert all efforts to preserve the security of Iraq and Syria, according to the official readout of the call.

“What is happening in Syria today is in the interest of the Zionist entity [Israel], which deliberately bombed Syrian army sites in a way that paved the way for terrorist groups to control additional areas in Syria,” the Iraqi prime minister’s office quoted Sudani as saying.

Mainly Sunni Muslim rebels opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad seized the city of Aleppo last week in their biggest advance in years. Iraq’s Shi’ite-led government has close relations with Iran, which is an ally of Assad, and Iraqi militia fighters have fought on Assad’s side in the war.

Two Iraqi security sources and a senior Syrian military source told Reuters on Monday that hundreds of Iraqi Shi’ite militia fighters had crossed the border late on Sunday to help Assad’s army fight the rebel advance.

The head of Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces, which includes the major Shi’ite militia groups aligned with Iran, said no group under its umbrella had entered Syria.

The Syrian rebels have said their advance over the past week met little resistance, in part because the most powerful of Iran’s allies, Lebanon’s Hezbollah group, had pulled its forces out of Syria to battle Israel in Lebanon.

Israel, which has long struck what it says are Iran-aligned military targets in Syria, has stepped up such strikes over the past 14 months as it battled Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.

(Reporting by Jaidaa Taha; Editing by Peter Graff)