Iraq PM defends anti-Daesh cooperation plan

Iraq’s Premier Haider al-Abadi has come out in support of Baghdad’s intelligence-sharing deal with Iran, Russia, and Syria for battling the Daesh Takfiri group.

He made the remarks on Monday in a televised speech before leaving for New York to attend the UN General Assembly.

Abadi also welcomed Russia’s “recent interest” in fighting Daesh, saying, “During the past three months, there has been an interest by Russia to fight Daesh, as many terrorists who are fighting with it are Russian who would return to Russia to carry out terrorist acts.”

The remarks come after the Iraqi military’s joint operations command announced in a Saturday statement that Iraqi officials are engaged in intelligence and security cooperation with officials from the three counties in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.

The statement added that the cooperation had come “with increased Russian concern about the presence of thousands of terrorists from Russia undertaking criminal acts with Daesh.”

Sergei Smirnov, the first deputy director of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), said on September 18 that up to 2,400 Russian citizens are currently fighting on the side of the Daesh terrorist group.

According to Russian media reports, the leadership of the joint center will be determined on a rotating basis among the four countries, starting with Iraq.