Iraq PM: victory over ISIS is a 'triumph of civilisation'

Iraqi security forces are a 'symbol of pride' for the country, Mustafa Al Kadhimi says in anniversary speech

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhimi praised the security forces for the victory over ISIS in 2017. Reuters

Iraq's defeat of ISIS  was a “triumph of civilisation”, Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhimi said on Thursday in a speech to mark three since years since Baghdad declared victory over the extremist militants.

Mr Al Kadhimi said the victory “was achieved by the sacrifice of Iraqi blood” and warned against attempts to threaten the country’s stability.

“I want to say that anyone who attempts to undermine the dignity of Iraq, its land and people’s safety that we are here and Iraq is bigger than you,” Mr Al Kadhimi said.

He praised the Iraqi security forces as a “symbol of pride” for the country.

“On this day, your faith, and your Iraqi national roots won us victory over ISIS,” he said, speaking from the western city of Fallujah that was once held by the militants and is still recovering from the devastation of their occupation and the battle to retake it.

The group's reign of terror in northern and western Iraq began in June 2014 with the capture of the northern city of Mosul, which was also the last Iraqi city to be retaken from ISIS in July 2017 by Iraqi forces backed by a US-led coalition.

Much of Mosul was destroyed during the nine-month assault to liberate it, particularly the Old City, where the militants blew up the historic Great Mosque of Al Nuri and its famous leaning Al Hadba minaret as Iraqi forces advanced.

ISIS was progressively squeezed into an ever-shrinking pocket of desert straddling the frontier between Iraq and Syria, but Mosul and other northern areas continue to see a number of attacks blamed on sleeper cells.

ISIS claimed responsibility for a rocket attack on the Siniya oil refinery in the northern province of Salahuddin on Sunday.
The attack set off a fire at the refinery that firefighters were still trying to bring the blaze under control on Thursday, officials said.

No casualties were reported.

On Wednesday, two oil wells in neighbouring Kirkuk province caught fire as a result of two explosions in the pipelines, but neither ISIS nor any other faction has claimed responsibility for those attacks.

Much of the damage caused by Iraq's war on ISIS has yet to be repaired, something Mr Al Kadhimi blamed on previous government's, while the sectarian divisions and public anger over poverty, corruption

and unemployment that contributed to the group's rise still remain.