LATEST: Oil Ministry Accuses Kurds of Seizing Oilfields

FRIDAY FEATURE

Iraq and Syria Q&A: Where Does Islamic State Gets Its Funds?

Insurgents fought their way on Thursday into a military base in Diyala Province, northeast of Baghdad, according to a security source and a local official.

The base is on the edge of Muqdadiya, 80 km (50 miles) from the capital. Insurgents already held the northern side of the town.

The security source said the insurgent force includes hundreds of non-Iraqi Arab fighters, heavily armed with some riding in tanks. He said negotiations, brokered by local tribal sheikhs, were being pursued for a truce.

The local official confirmed the militants had breached the site, although he said they would be repulsed: “They were able to control part of the base but we will retake it from them.”

The insurgents have advanced on the northeast front as far as Baquba, 10 miles south of Muqdadiya.

Oil Ministry Accuses Kurds of Seizing Oilfields

The Oil Ministry has accused Kurdish forces of seizing “crude oil (wells) in the Kirkuk and Bey Hassan oil fields”.

Halkurd Mulla Ali, the spokesman for the Ministry overseeing the Kurdish military, responded, “Peshmerga forces have not approached the oilfields in Kirkuk.”

However, Iraqi and Kurdish sources said Kurds have taken over production facilities at the Bai Hassan and Kirkuk oilfields, which produced a total of about 400,000 barrels per day.

An unnamed source within the Kurdistan Regional Government said they had been “forced to act to protect Iraq’s infrastructure after learning of attempts by Iraq oil ministry officials to sabotage it”.

The exchange on Friday followed Prime Minister Nuri Maliki’s accusation that Iraqi Kurdistan is harboring members of the Islamic State, Baathists, and Al Qa’eda.

The office of Kurdistan President Massoud Barzani shot back that Maliki “has become hysterical and has lost his balance” and said that, as he had “destroyed the country”, he should “apologize to the Iraqi people and step down”.

Insurgents Renew Assault on Ramadi in Western Iraq

Insurgents strong>have renewed their assault on Ramadi, the capital of Anbar Province in western Iraq.

In January, the largely-Sunni insurgency took part of the city, and occupied nearby Fallujah.

The insurgents have captured areas west of Ramadi since the fighting began Thursday afternoon, killing 11 police, bombing one police station, and taking control of another, according to officials.

Report: Iran Delegation in Erbil to Press Kurds to Mobilize Against Islamic State

The Kurdish outlet Rudaw, citing unnamed sources, says an Iranian delegation is in Iraqi Kurdistan’s capital Erbil to press the Kurds to mobilize forces against the Islamic State.

The sources said the Iranians have met with the Kurdistan Democratic Party and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan as well as Sunni representatives.

The Iranian envoys also reportedly met with Sunni representatives in Erbil, who asked that forces not be sent in to fight the jihadi-led insurgents from Shiite regions controlled by the government.

While other Kurdish parties have cautioned that the Kurds should stay out of a war that has turned into a Sunni uprising against the Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the Iranian-backed PUK has not explicitly backed that call.

Saadi Ahmed Pira, a member of the PUK leadership, suggested that the Islamic State’s “terrorists” should be stopped: “It is a humane and a patriotic task to confront them.”

However, Arif Tayfur, a member of the KDP leadership and deputy speaker of the Iraqi Parliament, said “It is true that Iran wants the Kurds to fight the Islamic State, but that is not a good idea. Although Iran has influence in the area, they want the Kurds to do the fighting.”

Islamic Front Denounces Islamic State’s Declaration of Caliphate

The Islamic Front, the largest insurgent bloc in Syria, has issued a lengthy statement explaining why the Islamic State’s declaration of a caliphate — and the naming of its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as “Caliph Ibrahim” — does not confirm to Sharia law and is damaging to Islam:

We see in the announcement of the Caliphate by the Kharijites of ISIS a malicious cunning against the Sunni Muslims in the area, which leads to battles among their ranks that scatter their power and provide the enemies of Islam all the sorts of excuses to start wars against the Muslim people and to divide their lands and steal their fortunes; and thus ISIS wastes the Ummah’s elements of advancement and delays the latter for a very long period of time; moreover, ISIS provokes the Ummah when they use its unripe fortunes before they are ready to be exposed in order to destroy them completely….

We should be servants of Allah the way He likes; we should not be deceived by the lies of the Kharijites; we should remain on the path of right that Allah ordered us to follow.

US Intelligence Asks Company Not to Remove Social Media Accounts of Islamic State

An employee with a major social media company has said that US intelligence officials asked the firm not to remove accounts of the Islamic State: “US intelligence prefers for these accounts to stay up, rather than come down.”

A US intelligence official said the accounts were being monitored to “assess the fluid Islamic State situation” over capabiilities, networks, and tactics.

PM’s Office Concedes Troops Cut Off at Baiji Refinery

An official from Prime Minister Nuri al Maliki’s office confirmed Thursday that Iraqi forces are besieged inside the Baiji oil refinery, attacked by insurgents since their advance from northern Iraq towards Baghdad last month.

However, the official disputes a news agency’s report that only 75 commandos were inside the refinery and were not being reinforced or supplied with food.

He claimed up to 1,500 counterterrorism forces are inside the 300-acre compound, about 125 miles north of Baghdad.

The official said the Government is making almost-daily food drops and sometimes can airlift troops into the facility, even though Iraqi ground forces cannot break through the insurgents ringing the facility.

Asked how 1,500 troops have been unable to break the siege imposed by a force that local residents say is less than 500, the official said the troops are “responsible for protecting the refinery only” and there has been no “concerted effort to clear the area”.

Residents and a politician in Baghdad said only about 75 Iraqi special operations forces remained inside the refinery.

Baiji is one of Iraq’s three refineries and handles all oil from the north.