Region

BAGHDAD — Three months after he took office with a mission to unite his broken, warring country, Iraq's new prime minister has swept away the divisive legacy of his predecessor with a burst of rapid and dramatic measures.

But Haider Al Abadi faces a huge challenge forging a common front against Islamic State fighters, rebuilding an ineffective army and reasserting a degree of central government authority across Iraq.

Time is short and the battle to contain the militants who control swathes of territory is draining the country's finances. Millions of people have been displaced and sectarian anger is growing.

Abadi has responded with a series of steps to improve the Shiite-led government's standing, not just with Iraqi Kurds and Sunni Arab tribes but also across borders with Gulf neighbours.

His successes include a deal last month with Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region on oil exports and budget payments, which followed months of dispute.

He has dismissed dozens of top army and security officers appointed by former premier Nouri Al Maliki, announced a campaign against corruption in the military, ordered curbs on arrests without a judge's authorisation, and decreed the speeding up of the release of detainees when courts order them to be set free.

"His biggest achievement was his desire for change, to deal with the mistakes of the last eight years," said former judge and minister Wael Abdulatif, referring to Maliki's two terms in office.

After Maliki alienated Iraq's Sunnis and Kurds by promoting hardline Shiite interests, Abadi has tried to win over Iraq's Sunni tribes whose western and northern heartlands have emerged as the core of Islamic State power. He appointed a Sunni defence minister and has held talks with Sunni tribal leaders.

The moderate Shiite Islamist has also tried to mend fences with Sunni Arab states across the Gulf, an effort which has not gone unnoticed in the region.

"What I heard and saw from the prime minister is frankly the difference between day and night (compared with) what we've known and what we've heard from the previous prime minister Maliki," said United Arab Emirates Foreign Minister Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahayan, shortly after visiting Baghdad last month.

Regional Sunni power Saudi Arabia is talking, once again, about reopening its embassy in Baghdad soon.

‘Dismantling Maliki's state’

Abadi shocked many Iraqis last month when he said an investigation had found that at least 50,000 "ghost soldiers" were on the army payroll, taking salaries without showing up for duty and paying off officers who let them stay at home.

Promising greater accountability and transparency, he has also said he will win parliamentary approval for the 2015 budget, unlike this year's budget which was never endorsed due to acrimony between Maliki and political parties.

Like Maliki, 62-year-old Abadi is a veteran member of the Islamist Dawa Party. This was outlawed under Saddam Hussein and both men fled the country, returning only after Saddam was toppled in 2003.

But while Maliki spent his exile living between Damascus and Iran and working for the opposition under an assumed name, Abadi, a qualified engineer, set up business in Britain where he worked for more than 20 years.

He projects a pragmatic and business-like approach to governing, in contrast to the dogmatic and secretive style which critics saw in Maliki.

"He's dismantled much of Maliki's state," said a senior Western diplomat in Baghdad, approvingly. "If you look at the achievements of this government, it delivers. But it must be given time."

During his term in office, Islamic State forces have been pushed back from Jurf Al Sakhr south of Baghdad and two towns near the Iranian border, while the militants' five-month siege of Iraq's largest oil refinery has been lifted.

But none of the political or military gains is irreversible. The job of imposing central authority remains, and some believe his momentum will stall.

"He started off well and he's got the right approach, but a more positive attitude is not sufficient to put Humpty Dumpty together again," said Kurdish regional government spokesman Safeen Dizayee, noting that Abadi may face discontent not just from outside but also among his own constituents.

That was apparent soon after the Kurdish oil deal was announced when a delegation from the Shiite city of Basra said their southern region, which produces by far the most of Iraq's oil, should have some of the same autonomy enjoyed by Kurds.

So far Abadi's overtures to Sunnis in the western province of Anbar, whose support is vital for any long-lasting drive against Islamic State, have been met with scepticism from tribal leaders who say they have received desperately little reinforcement from Baghdad.

Ayham Kamel, an analyst with the Eurasia Group consultancy, said 2014 marked Abadi's political honeymoon, and perhaps the peak of his limited powers.

Next year could be tougher. After victories against Islamic State in mixed sectarian regions, Abadi will face pressure to drive home the offensive in the group's Sunni heartlands.

Continued reliance on Shiite militias rather than the army, as well as dependence on US-led air support, highlights the weakness of Abadi's state.

"There is still a central government in Baghdad that is nominally in charge of the country as a whole," Kamel said. "But in real terms the central government is less relevant in Kurdish areas, it is irrelevant in the Sunni heartland and it is also less relevant in the [Shiite] south."

ROME — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Monday angrily rejected a Palestinian bid to set a UN deadline for an end to Israel's occupation amid a flurry of talks led by US top diplomat John Kerry.

"We will not accept attempts to dictate to us unilateral moves on a limited timetable," the Israeli leader said before arriving in Italy.

Amid a renewed drive to push the Israeli-Palestinian peace process to the top of the global agenda, Kerry and Netanyahu met for nearly three hours in the US ambassador's sumptuous residence in Rome.

The Americans are seeking to avert an end-of-year showdown at the United Nations Security Council, which could place them in a diplomatic quandary.

The Palestinians have said they will submit an Arab-backed draft text setting a two-year deadline for an end to the decades-long Israeli occupation of their lands to the UN as early as Wednesday.

Simultaneously France is leading European efforts to cobble together a more nuanced resolution which could prove more acceptable to the US administration.

The French text would set a two-year timetable, but for concluding a peace treaty without mentioning the withdrawal of Israeli forces.

Paris is also hoping to seize more of the initiative by not leaving the negotiations solely in the hands of the US.

"The absence of a peace process is fuelling tensions on the ground, so it is imperative to make rapid progress on a UN resolution," said French foreign ministry spokesman Romain Nadal.

“It is vital to relaunch the peace talks as soon as possible and on a credible basis to offer some kind of concrete political horizon to the parties,” he told AFP.

US officials have said Kerry is aiming to learn more about the European initiative during his hastily-arranged pre-Christmas trip.

Traditionally the US has used its power of veto at the UN Security Council to shoot down what it sees as moves against its close regional ally, Israel.

But there is a growing impatience in Europe over the peace impasse amid fears the Middle East risks spiralling into even greater chaos.

Several European parliaments have called on their governments to move ahead with the recognition of a Palestinian state.

US officials told reporters accompanying Kerry that Washington has not yet decided whether to veto or back the French-led UN initiative.

The US administration opposes moves to bind negotiators’ hands through a UN resolution — particularly any attempt to set a deadline for the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the West Bank.

No ‘diktats’ 

But a US veto risks running contrary to Washington’s avowed aim of a Palestinian state and would anger key Arab allies — many of whom are much-needed partners in the US-led coalition against Islamic State militants.

And Netanyahu said that “in the reality in which Islamic terrorism is reaching out to all corners of the globe, we will rebuff any attempt that would put this terrorism inside our home”.

“We will stand firm in the face of any diktat,” the Israeli leader said ahead of Monday’s talks, which included a brief closed-doors meeting with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.

Kerry also met with the Vatican’s Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin and thanked Pope Francis for “his engagement to try to reduce tensions in the region”.

The US secretary of state was due to fly to Paris for a dinner meeting with his French, German and British counterparts and the new EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini at Orly airport.

He will then travel to London to meet with the chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat and the secretary general of the Arab League, Nabil Al Arabi, on Tuesday.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius is also to meet with Arabi on Tuesday.

Diplomatic sources say Paris is hoping to persuade the Palestinians to back their compromise resolution, rather than risk a US veto of the more muscular Arab version.

But the Palestinians appear divided, as frustration grows over the snail’s pace of diplomatic efforts, with the decision resting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

BEIRUT — Militants linked to Al Qaeda dealt a major blow to Syria's regime on Monday by seizing two key army bases within hours, giving them control over most of Idlib province.

The gains also signalled another defeat for Western-backed rebels who were driven out of most of the northwestern province last month by the jihadist Al Nusra Front.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Al Nusra Front — the battered country's Al Qaeda branch — seized Hamidiyeh and Wadi Al Deif, the regime's largest outposts in Idlib.

The jihadists advanced in coordination with Islamist rebel groups Ahrar Al Sham and Jund Al Aqsa, the observatory said, adding that a string of villages in the area also fell.

Al Nusra Front claimed via Twitter it was "the only faction that took part in the liberation of Wadi Al Deif", and that it was now "chasing down" soldiers.

State television cited a military source as implicitly acknowledging the loss.

"The army redeployed this morning in the Wadi Al Deif region and is engaged in fierce fighting at Hamidiyeh," it reported the source as saying.

The attack on Wadi Al Deif, which began on Sunday, killed at least 31 troops and 12 jihadists, the observatory said.

Speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, a source from Lebanon’s Shiite Hizbollah movement which had deployed fighters to bolster regime efforts in Idlib said “more than 3,000 [Islamist] gunmen” joined the twin offensive.

Mainstream rebels had been battling to take Wadi Al Deif and Hamidiyeh for around two years, but despite repeated attempts had failed to do so.

Rise of the jihadists 

Charles Lister of the Brookings Doha Centre said the gains highlighted the rise of the jihadists in the province.

“The nature of the operations has served to underline the renewed prominence of more Islamically minded forces in Idlib, with Jabhat [Front] Al Nusra and Ahrar Al Sham having played the dominant role in practically capturing the facilities,” he said.

Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said Al Nusra had used tanks and heavy weapons captured last month from the Western-backed Syrian Revolutionary Front.

Its defeat of the SRF was seen as a blow to US efforts to create and train a moderate rebel force as a counterweight to jihadists of the Islamic State group.

Within hours of taking Wadi Al Deif, Al Nusra and the two other Islamist rebel groups also seized Hamidiyeh, the observatory said.

“They took 15 soldiers prisoner from Hamidiyeh,” Abdel Rahman said, adding that helicopters evacuated senior officers late Sunday, hours before it fell.

After Al Nusra and its allies moved in, regime warplanes launched 17 air raids against the base, the Britain-based group said.

Thomas Pierret, who teaches Islamic and Middle Eastern studies at the University of Edinburgh, said the advance is important militarily because the bases are on a road linking the central province of Hama to Aleppo in the north.

Top leadership wiped out 

Lister said the advance may pave the way for “a major assault on Idlib city”, which like most Syrian provincial capitals remains in regime hands.

The gains give Al Nusra firm control of much of Idlib province, limiting the chances of a challenge from potential rivals.

Until September this year, Ahrar Al Sham had sought to distance itself from more hardline jihadists in Syria.

But a September 9 explosion that killed its top leadership “pushed the group to align itself more openly with Al Nusra”, Abdel Rahman said.

“Now the two are fighting side by side.”

On Monday, Ahrar Al Sham broke its silence on the September blast, blaming “a criminal group” with “international links”. Abdel Rahman said this was an apparent reference to Western intelligence agencies.

Idlib was among the first provinces to fall, soon after the March 2011 outbreak of the armed revolt against President Bashar Assad’s rule.

Syria’s war began as a pro-democracy movement demanding his ouster, but later morphed into a brutal war after the regime unleashed a massive crackdown.

More than 200,000 people have been killed in nearly four years, and around half the population has been forced to flee.

BAGHDAD — At least 2,700 people, mostly soldiers, are missing as a result of attacks by the Islamic State (IS) group in Iraq, the human rights ministry said on Monday.

More than half of those registered as missing by the government are soldiers who were at the Speicher base which the jihadists captured six months ago near Tikrit.

"The number of missing from Speicher base has reached 1,660, from Badush prison 487, in addition to 554 from other areas, including 38 women," the ministry said in a statement.

Badush is a prison outside the northern city of Mosul, which IS has used as its main hub in Iraq.

The ministry said those numbers are based on applications filed by relatives and subsequent checking with the relevant ministries.

"The number of missing is likely higher than this," ministry spokesman Kamel Al Amin told AFP.

He said some families who have been displaced by the violence or live in areas under jihadist control were not able to report a missing relative.

He added that the ministry had asked the families of those confirmed to be missing to provide DNA samples "in order to identify victims who might later be found in mass graves".

According to Human Rights Watch, IS gunmen executed up to 600 inmates from Badush prison on June 10, forcing them to kneel along a nearby ravine before pushing them in and setting fire to the bodies.

The following day, they seized the Speicher base and claimed to have executed 1,700 Shiite troops. The rights group was able to find evidence that at least 560 had been killed.

KHARTOUM — The International Criminal Court's (ICC) decision to shelve an inquiry into war crimes in Sudan's Darfur region is likely to embolden hardliners in Khartoum and contribute to more violence, opposition and rebel leaders said on Monday.

The Hague-based court indicted Sudanese President Omar Hassan Al Bashir in 2009 for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in connection with the suppression of a revolt in Darfur. It said on Friday it would suspend the investigation, citing limited resources and deadlock at the UN Security Council.

Friday's decision prompted Bashir to claim victory over the court and declare a renewed push to end rebellions around Sudan.

"The decision will lead to a further deterioration in the humanitarian situation in Darfur, Blue Nile and South Kordofan as the military confrontation escalates," Jibril Bilal of Darfur's Justice and Equality Movement said.

Darfur has been embroiled in conflict since mainly non-Arab tribes took up arms in 2003 against the Arab-led government in Khartoum, accusing it of discrimination.

Darfur rebels have since joined forces with groups in the southern provinces of Blue Nile and South Kordofan, where an insurgency is raging, mounted mostly by ex-civil war fighters left in Sudan after the south seceded in 2011.

Sadiq Youssef of the National Consensus Forces umbrella opposition group said the ICC decision was intended to publicly pressure the Security Council to act on Darfur.

But analysts doubt it will have an effect without concessions by veto-wielding permanent members China and Russia, who have largely opposed action against Bashir.

SANAA — Iran has supplied weapons, money and training to the Shiite Houthi militia that seized Yemen's capital in September, as Tehran steps up its regional power struggle with Saudi Arabia, Yemeni and Iranian officials say.

Exactly how much support Iran has given the Houthis, who share a Shi'ite ideology, has never been clear. Sunni countries in the Gulf accuse Iran of interference via Shiite proxies in the region, something Tehran denies.

But Reuters has details — from Yemeni, Western and Iranian sources — of Iranian military and financial support to the Houthis before and after their takeover of Sanaa on September 21.

A senior Houthi official denied there had been material and financial support. But the assertions are still likely to reinforce Saudi, and Western, fears that Iran is exploiting turmoil between Sunni and Shiite Muslims in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Bahrain and now Yemen.

Riyadh has suspended aid to Yemen, angered by the Houthis' growing power, while Iran publicly welcomed the Houthi victory.

A senior Yemeni security official said Iran had steadily supported the Houthis, who have fought the central government since 2004 from their northern stronghold of Saadah.

"Before the entrance into Sanaa, Iran started sending weapons here and gave a lot of support with money via visits abroad," the official, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue, told Reuters.

A second senior Yemeni security official said "weapons are still coming in by sea and there's money coming in through transfers".

Swift victory

Iran, the first official said, saw victory would be swift in Yemen, unlike in Iraq and Syria, and "with not too much expense".

A Western source familiar with Yemen also said the Houthis had been getting training and money.

"It's been happening for over a year. We've seen Houthis going out to Iran and Lebanon for military training."

"We think there is cash, some of which is channelled via Hezbollah and sacks of cash arriving at the airport. The numbers of those going for training are enough for us to worry about," the source said. The first Yemeni security official said Houthi fighters had received training by Hezbollah in Lebanon.

A senior Iranian official told Reuters that the Quds Force, the external arm of the Revolutionary Guard, had a "few hundred" military personnel in Yemen who train Houthi fighters.

He said about 100 Houthis had travelled to Iran this year for training at a Revolutionary Guards base near the city of Qom. It was not immediately possible to verify this claim.

The official said there were a dozen Iranian military advisers in Yemen, and the pace of money and arms getting to the Houthis had increased since their seizure of Sanaa.

"Everything is about the balance of power in the region. Iran wants a powerful Shiite presence in the region that is why it has got involved in Yemen as well," said the Iranian official.

Salah Al Sammad, a senior Houthi adviser to the Yemeni president, denied Iran had provided arms but said Iranian backing was part of a shared vision in "confronting the American project".

For its part, Saudi Arabia provided "blatant" support to allied tribal sheikhs and parties in Yemen, he said.

Ship seized

Yemeni authorities point to the "Jihan 1" as evidence of Iran's support. The ship was seized by Yemen in 2013, smuggling weapons from Iran to local insurgents.

The Yemeni official showed Reuters a breakdown of the cargo, which included Katyusha rockets M-122, heat-seeking surface-to-air missiles, RPG-7s, Iranian-made night vision goggles and "artillery systems that track land and navy targets 40km away".

There were also silencers, 2.66 tonnes of RDX explosives, C-4 explosives, ammunition, bullets and electrical transistors.

A few days after the Sanaa takeover, Houthi gunmen surrounded the National Security headquarters calling for the release from jail of eight Yemeni crew members.

They were freed, as were two suspected Hezbollah members jailed for planning to provide military training to the Houthis.

Iran denied any connection with the arms found on Jihan 1.

Sanaa residents still can't understand how the Houthis managed to take control of their city.

Although the Houthis started as a small movement in north Yemen, they gained strength by tapping into the grievances of Zaydi Shiites, about a third of Yemen's population.

Their march to Sanaa was led by fighters who exploited popular discontent over corruption and the removal of fuel subsidies. They also exploited divisions within the army, which largely melted away at the decisive moment.

"Most of the fighting is done by local people supported by people from the Houthis," a Houthi fighter told Reuters.

With the Houthis now in control of the capital, the airport and most of the port of Hodeidah, there are fears of more overt support from Tehran.

MANAMA — Saudi billionaire businessman Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal is to launch an Arab satellite news channel on February 1, vowing to “break the mould” in a crowded field.

Bahrain-based Alarab News Channel, broadcasting in Arabic, said Monday it would usher in "a completely new style of news programming in the Middle East and beyond".

Through his Riyadh-based Kingdom Holding Co., Prince Alwaleed has diversified investments that include luxury global hotels as well as international media firms News Corporation and Time Warner.

Established pan-Arab satellite channels have been accused of reflecting the political views of their owners, particularly after the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings against authoritarian regimes in the Middle East and North Africa.

Alarab will enter a market revolutionised by Qatar-funded Al Jazeera almost 20 years ago when it became the region's first pan-Arab news television broadcaster.

Dubai-based Al Arabiya, belonging to the MBC Group owned and chaired by Sheikh Waleed Al Ibrahim, a brother-in-law of Saudi Arabia's late King Fahd, followed in 2003.

"Alarab will break the mould of news presentation, becoming a platform for transparent presentation and discussion of the region's most intractable issues," it said in a statement.

Alarab's general manager is Jamal Khashoggi, a veteran Saudi journalist forced to step down from the helm of the kingdom's Al Watan daily in 2010 after it ran an opinion column that angered religious conservatives.

Alarab will also be competing against other relative newcomers such as Sky News Arabia, France 24 in Arabic and the BBC's Arabic service.

RIYADH — A Saudi policeman was killed in a clash with a man armed with a machinegun who took three workers hostage near Riyadh, the state news agency SPA reported Monday.

Security forces came under heavy fire when they responded to the hostage-taking on Sunday night in Rawdhat Sider, in the Mujamma region close to the capital, it said.

The gunman, whose motives were not disclosed, was wounded and arrested, and the hostages were released, SPA said.

The agency said a policeman was killed and another wounded along with a civilian in the shoot-out.

Also on Sunday, a second member of the security forces was killed in a Shiite area of the Sunni-dominated kingdom, official media said.

SPA said a soldier was fatally wounded as officers came under attack from "an unknown gunman firing from farms" near Awamiya in eastern Saudi Arabia.

Awamiya, just west of Dammam city on the Gulf coast, has witnessed clashes between security forces and protesters from the minority Shiite community.

Saudi Arabia, which is taking part in US-led air strikes against the Islamic State jihadist group in Syria, last week announced the arrest of three suspected IS supporters over a November 22 incident in which a Danish national was shot and wounded in Riyadh.

GENEVA/DUBAI — President Hassan Rouhani said on Monday that he would try to clinch a nuclear deal with world powers despite opposition from some quarters in Iran.

Rouhani was speaking as Iran resumed talks with the United States in Geneva on its nuclear programme. An eventual deal would remove sanctions imposed on Tehran.

But his government must sell any agreement to hardliners in the Islamic Republic who are wary of any rapprochement with the West.

"Some people may not like to see the sanctions lifted. Their numbers are few, and they want to muddy the water," Rouhani, widely seen as a pragmatist, told a gathering of officials at a central bank seminar in Tehran.

He appeared to refer to hardliners including senior commanders of the elite Revolutionary Guards.

"The overwhelming majority of our nation — intellectuals, academics, theologians, the greats, and the leadership — are in favour of getting the sanctions removed," Rouhani said.

US and Iranian negotiators began a two-day meeting in Geneva before wider talks between Iran and six global powers in the same city on Wednesday on how to end the 12-year dispute over Tehran's nuclear programme.

Iran and the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China and Russia failed last month to meet a self-imposed deadline to resolve the stand-off, extending the talks for seven more months.

They aim to reach an agreement on the substance of a final accord by late March as more time would likely be needed to reach a consensus on the technical details.

Wendy Sherman, acting US deputy secretary of state, and Abbas Araqchi, Iran's deputy foreign minister, led their delegations in Monday's talks.

Iran's official news agency IRNA quoted an unnamed member of Tehran's delegation as saying uranium enrichment and how to remove sanctions were sticking points.

"Some differences have been bridged, some others haven't. There is need for more diplomacy and consultations," he said.

Iran's reluctance to scale back its capacity to enrich uranium — which can have both civilian and military uses — has drawn international sanctions that have severely hurt its economy.

Tehran denies Western allegations it has been seeking to develop the capability to assemble nuclear weapons.

In a new report, the International Crisis Group think tank said an agreement was within reach if both sides showed more flexibility on enrichment capacity and sanctions relief.

But it warned that differences "remain sharp and overcoming them will grow more difficult with time, as the voices of sceptics get louder”, referring to hardliners on both sides.

NAIROBI, Kenya — One year after mass violence broke out in South Sudan, battles between government forces and rebels continue, and aid officials say international assistance is needed to help residents stave off mass hunger.

Government troops and armed youths have been battling in Upper Nile state in recent days, a sign that widespread violence could return now that the six-month rainy season has ended.

Fighting broke out last December between President Salva Kiir's troops and those loyal to former vice president Riek Machar. Since then, more than 1.5 million South Sudanese have fled their homes, leaving many families without anyone to plant crops. The aid community had feared famine, but an injection of food supplies by the World Food Programme and other groups helped avoid that. If fighting resumes the specter of famine could return in 2015, warn aid groups.

Concern about South Sudan is waning and that it risks becoming "yet another forgotten state", the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Sunday.

"The spotlight may have turned away from South Sudan in recent months, but needs remain enormous and the situation is still serious," said Franz Rauchenstein, the head of the ICRC in South Sudan. "People caught up in this conflict cannot be forgotten."

The two sides have signed several peace deals brokered by neighbouring governments, but none has actually stopped the warfare in the oil-rich country.

Much of the violence has pitted the Dinkas who back Kiir against the Nuer who support Machar. Gross atrocities were committed by both sides, including the killings of elderly patients in hospital wards as well as the slaughter of hundreds of civilians in the capital last December, according to human rights groups.

South Sudan peacefully broke away from Sudan in 2011 after decades of war, becoming the world's newest nation. But the outbreak of violence last year shattered the goodwill the country had built up internationally.

South Sudan's cycle of ethnic revenge killings creates an urgent need to hold those responsible to account, said Human Rights Watch, adding that the war's widespread abuses should be investigated as war crimes and crimes against humanity.