Iraq: A New Global Crisis

Table of contents

Understanding A Troubled Region

The rise of ISIS: Are the answers embedded in Islam? 04

ISIS and crISIS: Time for West to introspect on clash of civilisations 07
All you need to know about ISIS, the group behind the Iraq crisis 10
From Syria to Libya: Why Obama relaxing his grip is bad news 13
Iraq insurgency: Why Gulf nations fear advancing militants 15
Iraqi insurgents work for hearts and minds in northern city 18
Iraq seeks U.S. air power against militants - officials 20

The Crisis Through An Indian Prism

Forty Indian construction workers kidnapped in Iraq 22

Why the kidnapping of Indians in Iraq is Modi’s first major crisis 24
Negotiation to evacuation: What India must do to save citizens in Iraq 26
Send us home or to another place: Kerala nurses in Tikrit 28
Iraq: Govt taking steps to ensure safety of 600 Telangana workers 29
Unable to contact those stranded in Iraq despite efforts: MEA 30
Iraq crisis: Is India prepared to foot high crude oil bills? 31
How the continuing Iraq crisis will impact India’s economy 33

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Understanding A Troubled Region

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

The rise of ISIS: Are the
answers embedded in Islam?
R. Jagannathan, June 19, 2014
A
new spectre is haunting the world - the
spectre of yet another terrorist outfit -
the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)
- that has suddenly fought its way to capture
huge swathes of territory in West Asia. It prom-
ises to be a nastier version of al Qaeda, and now
accuses the old al Qaeda of forgetting its initial
ideals.
Academics will again go about explaining how
the failure of President Obama to act in time
and the exclusionary nature of the Iraqi Shia
leadership gave space for Sunni-based ISIS to
grow, but this will be only a partial explanation.
The real explanation lies at the heart of Islam
and it goes back to the time of the Prophet.
Islam is not just a religion; it is also a system of
accumulating and consolidating political power.
Its ideology is perfectly suited for these goals.
This is what explains how a rag-tag bunch of
thugs and extortionists morphed into an all-
conquering army and now holds several towns
and large territories in Iraq and Syria. Soon ISIS
could be creating a caliphate - a dream aborted
in Afghanistan after the American invasion
pushed Mullah Omar out. If ISIS succeeds, it
will become a new power centre for political
Islam. But it won’t be the only one, for we still
have the Shia power centre in Teheran, and sev-
eral others elsewhere.
Islam is unique not for its great messages of
brotherhood and justice, which are certainly
inspiring, but in how it formally allows spiritual
and temporal power to reside together. They
reinforce one another.
The Prophet was not just the spiritual leader of
the early Muslims, but also their political leader
and head of the army. The ideology of Islam - an
extraordinary faith in one god, and none other -
is exactly the right one for claiming and consoli-
dating power and building empire.
Even though there are other religions that talk
of only one god - Judaism, Christianity and Zo-
roastrianism, among them - all of them, at least
in their modern forms, are more accommodat-
ing and pluralistic than Islam. The latter has
been rigid in its belief not only about one god,
but in not separating power from religion.
Sigmund Freud, in his book Monotheism, writes
about how monotheism evolved as an important
adjunct to the growth of empire. Most ancient
societies were polytheistic and plural. The wor-
ship of many gods was the norm even though
small tribal societies had their favourite gods.
But once tribes became kingdoms and king-
doms became small empires, the rulers - both
to consolidate power and to retain it - saw the
need to adopt some form of monotheism as
state ideology. At its basic level, monotheism
is about concentrating power in one person or
institution.
The first monarch who sought to go monotheist
was the Egyptian Pharaoh Amenhotep IV, who
in the 14the century BC declared Aten as the
supreme god. His priests did not like it much,
and his brand of monotheism - which some also
called henotheism - did not outlive him in poly-
theistic ancient Egypt.
The Arab tribes living in and around Mecca
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
before the advent of the Prophet were also poly-
theistic. This was what Mohammed decisively
changed when he destroyed all the idols at the
Kaaba and said only Allah was the true god.
The link between one god and power has been
recognised all through history. Emperor Con-
stantine wanted all rival versions of the Bible
destroyed so that there could be a unified Chris-
tianity. Thus we had the Nicene Creed. In India,
Mughal Emperor Akbar was declared secular
both because of the diversity he allowed and
also because he tried evolving a unified religion
called Din-e-Ilahi. But his own ulema were not
amused and the effort died an unsung death.
Akbar’s motives in evolving Din-e-Ilahi may
have had less to do with secularism and more
with the consolidation of power in a diverse
empire.
But it was the Prophet of Islam who took this
idea to its logical conclusion by making belief
in one god central to his religion, and giving his
followers the mandate to expand this to all of
humanity. He created the ultimate masculine
religion driven by the pursuit of both power and
spirituality.
Was this unique, was this different from the
two earlier Abrahamic religions – Judaism and
Christianity? Both of Islam’s predecessor faiths
emphasised one god and opposed idolatry. The
progress of the three religions was, however,
different. Judaism resisted change and stuck
to its belief that Jews were a chosen people.
Much like Hinduism, it sought no conversions
of other people to Judaism and ultimately posed
no threat to temporal powers. But Christian-
ity, once it grew out of its initial moorings in a
Jewish reform movement that also resisted the
Roman occupation of Palestine, became a pros-
elytising faith that could have threatened kingly
power. This is why Christianity had a difficult
existence in its initial phases, till Constantine
embraced it politically and made it a part of his
power base. After that, church and state were
often joint stakeholders in power, or shared an
uneasy relationship, till the European enlight-
enment forced the two apart.
Islam never saw any of these pressures and tus-
sles. From the start, the Prophet ensured the
merger of state and god – and there has been no
reformation, renaissance or enlightenment to
force a change.
A key feature of religions that emphasise mono-
theism is that rival monotheists are a threat to
it. It has to be my god, not your god. This is why
even though Islam accepts the validity of Jew-
ish and Christian prophets, its claim to having
the final word of god ensured centuries of con-
flict with both Judaism and Christianity – with
the crusades being the most logical outcome
of extreme monotheism and the combining of
temporal and spiritual power.
All consolidation of power needs an ideology
that's larger than self-interest, and the Prophet
created that combination in Islam where its fol-
lowers think nothing of sacrificing themselves
for achieving this ideal. This is why less than
100 years after his death, the warriors of Islam
had reached all over Asia, Africa and Europe.
The power and weakness of Islam lies precisely
in this mixing up of spiritual and temporal
power. It means anybody can use the appeal of
religion to seek power, and anyone with power
can claim Islam as his own. This means ambi-
tious warmongers can and will threaten not
only other rival states, but even states that are
formally Islamic. Genghis Khan ravaged many
Muslim states during his campaigns, but his
progeny embraced Islam. Taimur called himself
the Sword of Islam. Anyone seeking power can
merely say that he is the guardian of Islam, or
his is the right version of Islam, and go for it.
Thus Islamists after often a big threat to other
Islamists. An Osama bin Laden was as much a
threat to the Saudi monarchs as to America.
This is what explains the huge, bloodly schisms
of Islam - Shia-Sunni, Sunni-Ahmaddiyas, etc.
Every time you have managed to finish off an
al-Qaeda, an ISIS will rise. When ISIS fails - as
it surely will, for no terror can hold unnatural
countries together - another "truer" version
of Islam will rise. Pakistan is failing precisely
because it made Islam its ruling ideology. The
corollary to this ideology is: which Islam? This
can only lead to more bloodshed.
The vision of Islam - of converting the whole
world in order to have a peaceful world - is
impossible precisely because the ideology is
wedded to power. Anyone who seeks power can
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
claim to be the better Islam and make a grab for
it.

The world cannot do anything about this, and

especially by demonising Islam - as the west
and we in India sometimes tend to do. This is
an issue internal to Islam and will be addressed
only when enough Muslims begin to see the
dangers to themselves and their faith from this.
Let's remember, Christianity went through the
same process and needed the reformation and
enlightenment to separate church from state.

Islam will become a normal religion when two

things happen: when enough Muslims see
the damage they are doing to themselves and
call for change, and when the secular process
of women getting educated, empowered and
emancipated expands. The antidote to a hyper
masculine religion is feminine power.

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

 ISIS and crISIS: Time for West to
introspect on clash of civilisations
R. Jagannathan, June 19, 2014
T
he rise of a new West Asian terror group
– bunched under the banner of Islamic
State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) – has sent
shivers down western spines. India can’t be too
unconcerned, with 40 Indians said to have been
taken hostage by ISIS terrorists in Mosul, Iraq’s
second city that was captured last week.
While the short-term priorities for India and the
world are similar – rescue the hostages, and try
and cap the bloodshed between Shia and Sunni
forces in Iraq – once the crisis is past, the west
needs to introspect and ask itself how much of
the current west Asian (and world turmoil) is
due to its own selfish and incompetent interven-
tions in the past. In particular, it must rethink
and rewrite its own hubris-laden version of its
role in the history of modern civilisation and
ultra-modern barbarism.
Rudyard Kipling’s poem, “The white man’s
burden”, in which the racist poet asked America
to shoulder the burden of empire at the turn of
the 19th century, can now be stood on its head:
it is the rest of the world that has to shoulder
the messy burdens created by the white man’s
unholy colonial and post-colonial interventions.
This story has been unfolding for some time
now, starting with the end of colonialism
around the mid-20th century, and the divi-
sion of entire peoples on the basis of ethnicity,
religion, race, language, etc, accompanied by a
wholesale redrawing of world maps. The west
created nation-states where none existed, and
cleaved tolerant national diversities into intol-
erant nation-states (India-Pakistan, Palestine,
whole countries in Africa).
It is not my purpose to rant against what hap-
pened in the last century, but to point out that
a lot of the current world turmoil is the result
of many western ideas that we have all inter-
nalised and believe to be self-evidently true.
Among these: the idea of western universalism
(low tolerance of difference), the idea of the na-
tion-state (a utopian belief that an entire people
can have common beliefs, and who stay in the
same geography), the belief in binaries (good
versus evil, black versus white, “I-am-right-
you-are-wrong”), the belief in rigid secularism
(church vs state) as opposed to a more benign
pluralism (be what you want to be, never mind
if your beliefs are different from mine), et al.
The only modern idea emanating from the west
– or at least articulated extensively in the west –
is the idea of the individual as the crucial unit of
civilisation, with her own inalienable rights. The
rest of it is open to question.
At the root of all western belief systems and
assertion of western superiority is one implicit
truth: might is right. This is the reality of west-
ern influence, and not all the bright ideas of
freedom and enlightenment that Anglophones
rave about. No one got this better than Samuel
Huntington, the late author of The Clash of Civ-
ilisations. He observed quite pithily: "The west
won the world not by the superiority of its ideas
or values or religion...but rather by its superior-
ity in applying organised violence. Westerners
often forget this fact; non-westerners never do."
The US, South America and Australia were
settled through a process of violent extermina-
tion and subjugation. Europe separated itself
into narrow ethnicities settled into small ge-
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
ographies after years of bloody warfare among
themselves. The modern European nation-state
is thus the result of long-term ethnic cleans-
ing – hardly the ideal for today. What the Eu-
ropeans did to themselves, they inflicted on
their colonial territories in America, Africa and
Asia, too. They brought new ideas of power and
universalism in order to extract wealth from
their colonies, but in the process they damaged
the innate diversities of native peoples. (For
a critique of western universalism, read Rajiv
Malhotra’s book Being Different)
This is not to suggest that the pre-colonial eras
were times of peaceful coexistence between
people. Not quite. Tribes, regions, races, and re-
ligious groups fought one another often, but no
strife was permanent. It needed the European
concept of binaries – good versus evil, my god
versus your god – that allowed for no grey areas
and made conflicts endemic and intractable. It
demanded an artificial universalism where only
one thing could be right, and only one idea can
prevail.
This is why we are now seeing implacable foes
of the west and Christianity surfacing in West
Asia. Remember, the idea of religious war was
invented by the church. This is the idea that led
to the crusades, and what we are witnessing in
West Asia is a renewal of this primeval conflict
between Islam and Christianity. The post-World
War domination of West Asia by America has
only added new zest to this enmity. In the last
25 years, the Americans have been trying to
rework the map of the Arab world by separating
them into good Muslims and bad. It will now
learn that this is one more binary that has gone
bad.
Western scholars will be raising the usual ques-
tion after Mosul: What is it about Islam that it
regularly throws up violent ideologies? They
will find some answers by looking into their
own past - and into the mirror. Religion as a
cause for war was an invention of the European
church. Today's Islamists are only returning the
fire with their own version of the crusades.
While America has always been home to radical
born-again Christian fundamentalism, Europe
has also seen a rapid rise in right-wing groups
- with recent European parliament elections
giving them unexpected gains. In a sense, the
continent that launched the crusades against
Islam is getting back to the crusade mindset at
its fringes. Mainstream Europe is meanwhile
embracing another fundamantalism - a secular
fundamentalism where head scarves will be
banned even while European courts will protect
crosses in schools on grounds of tradition.
Nor is this reversal to old cultural identities only
a western preoccupation. In Russia, Orthodox
Christianity is back. In Japan, the old feeling
of being wronged, by the imposition of victors’
justice after defeat in the Second World War,
is surfacing again. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe
now regularly pays obeisance to the war-dead
by visiting the Yasukuni shrine – despite huge
Chinese anger.
In Turkey, Kemalist secularism is in retreat, and
the country (under Tecip Erdogan) now sees
itself as a leader of the Islamic world. Turkey
does not think twice about taking anti-Israel
positions. Radical and/or tribal groups are rul-
ing the roost - legitimately or illegitimately - in
much of Africa outside South Africa.
In south east Asia and south Asia, religious
identity is making a comeback - in India, in Sri
Lanka, in Myanmar, in Thailand, not to speak of
the Muslim majority nations of Indonesia and
Malaysia. Even tiny Maldives was not free from
religious iconoclasm and bigotry, with Bud-
dhist images being smashed in the coup that
dethroned an elected president in 2012.
There is, of course, a danger is trying to link
separate events and developments to a single or
similar set of causes. But the trend is so wide-
spread that it is impossible to deny a connecting
thread between these developments.
The connecting threads are the following.
Worldwide, as modernisation, globalisation and
technology threaten jobs and livelihoods every-
where, including in that bastion of capitalism,
America, people are harking back to an era that
they believe was simpler - a golden age. Reli-
gious fundamentalists and traditionalists are
selling dreams of an ideal past that never was -
and people are desperate enough to buy.
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
In all cases, the outsider is seen or shown to be
standing in the way of achieving this ideal past.
If the Arab world sees America as the great devil
out to subvert pristine Islam, Americans are
equally willing to erect Islamism and the related
terrorism as the greatest threat to world peace.
The pace of change - political, economic and
social - is now very threatening to large sections
of people in every part of the world. The result-
ing sense of helplessness, the inability to control
this pace of change, makes people vulnerable to
simple solutions. People are rebelling against
complexity and lack of control over their lives
by opting for simplistic solutions like "Islam is
the answer". Anger and impotence have been
harnessed by radical forces by creating imagi-
nary external enemies and jihadist propaganda.
Huntington again got it right when he said: “In
the emerging world of ethnic conflict and civili-
sational clash, Western belief in the universality
of Western culture suffers three problems: it is
false; it is immoral; and it is dangerous.”
The Clash of Civilisations is something all fun-
damentalists believe in - both in the west and
the Arab world. The latest version is currently
playing out in Iraq with ISIS as lead actor. The
best the west can do is act humble, and stay out
of the conflict unless both parties invite it over.
It's interventions have only worsened matters
everywhere in the past.

While the harking back to simple ideologies is a

worldwide phenomenon, it has been instrumen-
tal in reawakening the old Abrahamic fault-lines
between Christianity and Islam. While the west
sees Islam itself as a threat, the Islamists see
western modernity and its offshoots - consum-
erism, globalisation, and secularism - as the
threat.

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

All you need to know about ISIS,
the group behind the Iraq crisis
Agencies, June 19, 2014
T
he Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
(ISIL also known as ISIS), which dealt a
spectacular blow to Baghdad's Shiite-led
government by grabbing Iraq's second city Mo-
sul, now poses a threat across the Middle East.
Known for its ruthless tactics and suicide bomb-
ers, ISIS has already controlled the Iraqi city
of Fallujah for five months, and is also argu-
ably the most capable force fighting President
Bashar al-Assad inside Syria.
Its takeover of Mosul on Tuesday prompted the
United States to voice deep concern about the
"extremely serious" situation and warn the ji-
hadist Sunni group poses "a threat to the entire
region".
UN chief Ban Ki-moon's spokesman said he was
"gravely concerned by the serious deteriorating
of the security situation in Mosul".
ISIS is led by the shadowy Abu Bakr al-Baghda-
di and backed by thousands of Islamist fighters
in Syria and Iraq, many of them Westerners,
and it appears to be surpassing al-Qaeda as the
world's most dangerous jihadist group.
Western governments fear it could eventually
emulate al-Qaeda and strike overseas, but their
biggest worry for now is likely the eventual
return home of foreign fighters attracted by ISIS
and Baghdadi.
Among them are men like Mehdi Nemmouche,
a 29-year-old Frenchman who allegedly carried
out a deadly shooting on a Jewish museum in
Belgium last month after spending a year fight-
ing with ISIS in Syria.
The Soufan Group, a New York-based consul-
tancy, estimates that 12,000 foreign fighters
have travelled to Syria, including 3,000 from
the West.
And ISIS appears to have the greatest appeal,
with King's College London Professor Peter
Neumann estimating around 80 per cent of
Western fighters in Syria have joined the group.
Unlike other groups fighting Assad, ISIS is seen
working towards an ideal Islamic emirate that
straddles Syria and Iraq. And compared with
al-Qaeda's franchise in Syria, Al-Nusra Front, it
has lower entry barriers.
ISIL has also sought to appeal to non-Arabs,
recently publishing two English-language maga-
zines, having already released videos in English,
or with English subtitles.
The jihadist group claims to have had fight-
ers from the Britain, France, Germany and
other European countries, as well as the United
States, and from the Arab world and the Cauca-
sus.
Much of the appeal also stems from Baghdadi
himself – the ISIL leader is touted as a battle-
field commander and tactician, a crucial dis-
tinction compared with al-Qaeda chief Ayman
al-Zawahiri.
"For the last 10 years or more, (Zawahiri) has
been holed up in the Afghanistan-Pakistan
border area and hasn't really done very much
more than issue a few statements and videos,"
said Richard Barrett, a former counter-terror-
ism chief at MI6, Britain's foreign intelligence
service.
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
"Whereas Baghdadi has done an amazing
amount – he has captured cities, he has mobi-
lised huge amounts of people, he is killing ruth-
lessly throughout Iraq and Syria.
"If you were a guy who wanted action, you
would go with Baghdadi," Barrett told AFP.
Baghdadi apparently joined the insurgency
that erupted in Iraq soon after the 2003 US-led
invasion.
In October 2005, American forces said they
believed they had killed "Abu Dua," one of
Baghdadi's known aliases, in a strike on the
Iraq-Syria border.
But that appears to have been incorrect, as he
took the reins of what was then known as the
Islamic State of Iraq, or ISI, in May 2010 after
two of its chiefs were killed in a US-Iraqi raid.
Since then, details about him have slowly trick-
led out.
2011
On December 22, four days after the US with-
drawal from Iraq, a series of attacks in Baghdad,
in which 60 are killed, is claimed by a branch of
Al-Qaeda, the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI). Led by
the shadowy Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, ISI was set
up after the US-led invasion in 2003.
The ISI is particularly influential in the prov-
inces of Anbar, Nineveh and Kirkuk, where a
jihadist insurrection inflicted heavy losses on
US forces between 2003 and 2006, especially in
Fallujah in Anbar province.
2012
Considering itself mistreated and sidelined
from positions of power, Iraq's Sunni minority
launches massive demonstrations which con-
tinue throughout 2013, especially in Anbar.
Fuelled by Sunni ire and the conflict in Syria,

In October 2011, the US Treasury designated

him as a "terrorist" in a notice that said he was
born in the Iraqi city of Samarra in 1971.

And earlier this year, Iraq released a picture

they said was of Baghdadi, the first from an of-
ficial source, depicting a balding, bearded man
in a suit and tie.
At the time Baghdadi took over, his group ap-
peared to be on the ropes, after "the surge" of
US forces combined with the shifting allegianc-
es of Sunni tribesmen to deal him a blow.

But the group has bounced back, expanding into

Syria in 2013.
Baghdadi sought to merge with Al-Nusra, which
rejected the deal, and the two groups have oper-
ated separately since.
Zawahiri has urged ISIS to focus on Iraq and
leave Syria to Al-Nusra, but Baghdadi and his
fighters have openly defied the al-Qaeda chief
and, indeed, have fought not only Assad, but
also Al-Nusra and other rebel groups.
Here is a timeline of the advance of the
group, which has been facilitated by the
internal conflict between the Sunni mi-
nority and the ruling Shiites:
unrest reaches its worst point for five years,
with 9,475 civilians killed in 2013 according to
the non-governmental organisation Iraq Body
Count.
On a daily basis, bombs devastate markets,
mosques and even funerals. The jihadists attack
prisons and army barracks.
Security forces try to react by breaking up Sunni
camps and carrying out huge operations against
the jihadists.

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

2013
Allied to some Sunni tribes and benefiting from
the sprawling desert in the west to hide out,
jihadists claiming allegiance to the Islamic State
of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), an offshoot of the
ISI and which also operates in Syria, emerge in
April.
2014
On January 2-4, jihadists take control of Fal-
lujah and parts of Ramadi, and Baghdad faces
losing control of major towns for the first time
since the US invasion in 2003. Some 500,000
people flee the fighting, according to the United
Nations.
Just before the April 30 legislative elections,
the ISIL fights at the entrance to Baghdad and
parades in broad daylight at Abu Ghraib some
20 kilometres (12 miles) from the capital.
On May 5, insurgents attack Samarra, 110 kilo-
metres (70 miles) to the north of Baghdad, a
symbolic city since an attack against a revered
Shiite shrine in 2006 which sparked the sectar-
ian war of 2006-2007. After fierce fighting, the
army, helped by tribal members, retakes the
city.
A month later jihadists attack the university
of Anbar in Ramadi and targets in Mosul, the
country's second biggest city and capital of Nin-
eveh province.
On June 10, ISIL and other jihadists seize Mo-
sul and take control of Nineveh province, spark-
ing a mass exodus of some half a million people.
It also overruns sections of the nearby provinces
of Kirkuk and Salaheddin.
The authorities seem powerless faced with the
jihadists' dazzling advance. Maliki offers to arm
civilians who are prepared to take on the insur-
gents. Powerful Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr,
who led the once-feared Mahdi Army militia,
calls for the formation of units to defend reli-
gious sites in Iraq.
© 1994-2014 Agence France-Presse
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
 From Syria to Libya: Why
Obama relaxing his grip is bad news
Wajahat Qazi, June 19, 2014
T
he United States’ loquacious president
Barack Obama, has hailed the capture
and arrest of the alleged ring leader of
the 2012 attack on the US embassy in Benghazi,
Abu Khattala. In the wake of the arrest, the
United States’ president asserted that, "It's a
message to the world, that when Americans are
attacked, no matter how long it takes, we will
find those responsible and we will bring them
to justice. Regardless how long it takes, we will
find you."
While too much cannot and should not be
inferred from statements like these, it would
not be inaccurate to state that Obama’s asser-
tions reflect the broad tenor, tone and pattern of
American foreign policy under Obama. Ameri-
can foreign policy since Obama became presi-
dent has been characterized by a steady retreat
from the world and a very narrow definition of
American interests.
In this formulation and schema, the United
States’ acts of commission and omission will
be determined only by the nature of the threat
to its national interests. This approach corre-
sponds to the theoretical formulation and thrust
of realism- a theoretical paradigm whose start-
ing point and point of departure is the state and
concomitantly state interests.
The national interests that flow from this para-
digm are narrow; while the state continues to be
the locus of international politics and relations,
a range and slew of new actors and develop-
ments have taken place that render some of the
tenets of realism less salient. Conforming to
realism in a world where forces and actors other
than the state jostle for space and attention is
akin to using outdated medicine or medical
techniques to combat a disease that has mu-
tated.
The consequences of this approach on the
United States’ foreign policy and the world at
large are deleterious. Consider the United States
first. The country is gradually relinquishing
and abdicating its leadership role. It is retreat-
ing into itself. The moral component of foreign
policy is giving way to a crude real politik where
foreign policy is determined by a narrow calcu-
lus of interests.
The result is a messy, inchoate and disconnect-
ed foreign policy which neither speaks to the
United States’ interests nor the world at large.
The interests of the country cannot really be dis-
connected from that of the contemporary world.
To repeat the cliché, we live in a hyper-con-
nected world defined by intense issue linkages
where an issue in a remote corner of the world
can have ripple effects in other, distant parts.
This naturally and inevitably affects security
and peace, within and without. In the anarchic
world of states, complemented by other non
state forces and actors contemporarily, overlain
by complex interdependence, a supra state au-
thority is required to maintain peace and ensure
security.
This role falls, by default on the United States.
Abdicating and retreating from it can only lead
to parlous situations and global insecurity. The
butchery in Syria carried out by the Assad re-
gime, the gradual morphing of Iraq into a failed,
anarchic state, may constitute classic examples
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
of this abdication. Conforming to realism and All this has left the United States unmoored
a narrow definition of interests in a complex and increasingly shaky and uncertain. Both the
world will axiomatically lead to a foreign policy United States and the world have borne the
characterized by ad hocism and a one step for- consequences of this. All, however, is not over.
ward, two step backwards approach. Obama’s The United States needs to do a salvage job
hailing of Aby Khattala’s capture while Iraq and then re-assert itself forcefully and deftly. A
burns and Syria languishes in an orgy of vio- good starting point may be Syria. If the United
lence reflect this policy ad hocism and discon- States course corrects and reviews its posture ,
nection eloquently. What then could be United the country and the world will be better for it.
States’ foreign policy orientation? It is about time that the country re-engages the
world.
The United States post September foreign policy
misadventures have made it wary of looking
beyond itself and squeamish about the use
of force. The country’s ‘power elite’ , instead
of leading appear to be led by public opinion
and domestic political compulsions. President
Obama has turned out to be a bit of a damp
squib who has neither left an imprimatur on the
country nor left a legacy.

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

Iraq insurgency: Why Gulf nations
fear advancing militants
AP, June 19, 2014
D
ubai, United Arab Emirates: Saudi
Arabia and other petro-powerhouses
of the Gulf for years encouraged a flow
of private cash to Sunni rebels in Syria. Now an
al-Qaida breakaway group that benefited from
some of that funding has stormed across a wide
swath of Iraq, and Gulf nations fear its extrem-
ism could be a threat to them as well.
Those countries are trying to put the brakes
on the network of private fundraisers sending
money to the rebel movement, hoping to halt
financing going to the radical Islamic State of
Iraq and the Levant.
Fundraising clerics complain that they are being
told not to collect money for any Syrian rebels.
"Right now there is a siege. All the Gulf coun-
tries that were supportive have barred that sup-
port," Kuwaiti cleric Nabil al-Awadi angrily said
on his TV program.
At the same time, the Gulf states sharply oppose
any US military assistance to Iraq's Shiite-led
government aimed at stopping the extremists'
rapid advance. And they are furious at the pos-
sibility that Washington could cooperate with
top rival Iran to help Iraq.
Their stance reflects the complex tangle of
national rivalries and sectarian enmities in the
region. Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia, along with its
Gulf allies, have had the primary goal of stop-
ping the influence of mainly Shiite Iran in the
Middle East, and they deeply oppose Iran's ally,
Iraqi Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki,
whom they accuse of discriminating against his
country's Sunni minority.
Gulf states are torn over the Islamic State's
victories. While they would welcome a more
Sunni-friendly government in Iraq, they also
fear Islamic radicals might eventually turn their
weapons on the Gulf's pro-Western monarchies.
Gulf leaders also worry Iran will have an even
bigger role in Iraq — a scenario already begin-
ning to play out with top Iranian military figures
in Baghdad helping organize the army.
In phone calls this week with the leaders or
foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar
and the United Arab Emirates, US Secretary of
State John Kerry heard a chorus of disapproval
for any kind of US military operation to help
al-Maliki, such as airstrikes or train-and-equip
missions, according to US officials familiar
with the conversations. The officials spoke on
condition of anonymity because they were not
authorized to publicly discuss the private ex-
changes.
Earlier this week, Saudi Arabia's Cabinet put
out a statement blaming the insurgent explo-
sion on al-Maliki's government's marginaliza-
tion of the Sunni minority — "the sectarian and
exclusionary policies practiced in Iraq over the
past years."
Iraq's Cabinet replied on Tuesday with a furious
statement of its own, accusing Saudi Arabia of
fueling the Islamic States' rise and of "appease-
ment to terrorism." It said it holds the kingdom
accountable for "the resulting crimes, which are
tantamount to genocide."
The Islamic State's surge in Iraq is in part a
blowback from the Gulf countries' policies in
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
neighboring Syria, where they have backed the
Sunni-led rebellion in hopes of toppling another
of Iran's allies, President Bashar Assad.
With government consent, influential and even
state-linked Sunni clerics in the Gulf in recent
years urged men to join rebels in Syria and
drummed up donations for the Syrian cause in
campaigns in mosques, online and on TV. The
funds went to numerous Syrian rebel factions,
but some are believed to have gone to extremist
ones like the Islamic State.
David Cohen, of the US Treasury Department,
put the amounts raised in the hundreds of
millions. Some of that went to legitimate hu-
manitarian purposes, but much went the rebels,
including extremist groups, Cohen — who is the
undersecretary for terrorism and financial intel-
ligence — said in a speech earlier this year. He
did not provide more precise figures.
He said Kuwait has become "the epicenter of
fundraising for terrorist groups in Syria," and
money is being raised in Kuwait and Qatar for
the Islamic State as well al-Qaida's affiliate in
Syria, the Nusra Front. The US State Depart-
ment said Monday there is no evidence of Gulf
governments themselves funding Islamic State.
The head of the Western-backed Syrian opposi-
tion coalition, Ahmad Jarba, angrily denounced
the international community for failing to sup-
port more moderate rebels from the Free Syr-
ian Army and implicitly accused Gulf nations of
backing the Islamic State in a speech to a gath-
ering of leaders from Islamic countries in the
Saudi city of Jiddah on Tuesday.
"Some leaders believed they could use terror-
ists as hired mercenaries but suddenly found
themselves stuck with terrorists who used the
opportunity to advance their own interests and
agenda," Jarba said. Free Syrian Army fight-
ers have been battling Islamic State forces in
eastern Syria, trying to hold back their advances
there.
The Islamic State has emerged as one of the
most radical factions in Syria's civil war and
its priority, more than ousting Assad, has been
to achieve its dream of a cross-border "Islamic
emirate" in the region, starting with Iraq and
Syria. Even before the Islamic State swept over
Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, a week ago,
Gulf nations began to worry the group is too
uncontrollable, too ambitious and a potential
threat to their rulers, who al-Qaida and other
radicals have long said should be toppled.
The Islamic State "not only targets Kuwait, but
the entire region," Kuwait Deputy Foreign Min-
ister Khaled Al-Jarallah said, adding that Gulf
nations must "protect our internal front."
Governments began reining in their support for
rebels earlier this year. Saudi Arabia has warned
its citizens they will be prosecuted if they fight
abroad and labeled the Islamic State a terrorist
organization.
In Qatar, one of the most prominent clerics sup-
porting Syrian fighters, Sheik Yusuf al-Qarad-
awi, has not been on the pulpit for months. In
Kuwait, Nayef al-Ajmi, who held the posts of
justice minister and Islamic endowments min-
ister, resigned in May after the US Treasury
accused him of having a history of promoting
jihad in Syria, though the government insisted
his activities were "charitable, religious and
humanitarian."
Al-Awadi, who is part of a collective fundrais-
ing campaign for Syria by Kuwaiti charities, has
been accused by other prominent clerics in the
United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia of using
donations to fund the Islamic State.
"Pressure has been put on me to stop collect-
ing aid to Syria," he said, adding that directives
from the Kuwaiti government "were clear: Syria
is over." But he said money is still finding its
way through back channels.
Toby Matthiesen, author of "Sectarian Gulf"
and a research fellow at Cambridge University,
said that for now Saudi Arabia and other Gulf
countries are focused on "regime survival" and
countering Iran — and "playing all the cards
they can in this regional sectarian war trumps
everything else."
But the repercussions are unpredictable. The
Islamic State blitz could exacerbate sectarian
tensions between Sunnis and Shiites in flash-
points like Bahrain and eastern Saudi Arabia,
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
the heartland of the kingdom's Shiite minority.
It could also embolden al-Qaida-inspired fight-
ers against the Gulf countries.

The Gulf polices supporting rebels in Iraq and

Syria have been a "double-edged sword," Mat-
thiesen said. "My prediction is that in the mid to
long term, this will turn out to have been a bad
policy."

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

Iraqi insurgents work for hearts
and minds in northern city
Reuters, June 19, 2014
M
OSUL Iraq (Reuters) - It's been a
week since Sunni rebels took Iraq's
biggest northern city from the army
and - with security forces still on the defensive
- the fighters in Mosul are settling down and
starting to govern their new territory.
Militants from the Islamic State of Iraq and the
Levant, al Qaeda's wayward Iraqi offspring who
spearheaded last week's offensive across north
and western Iraq, drive around Mosul in stolen
police cars and station themselves at banks and
government buildings.
Haitham Abdul Salam, a 50-year-old black-
smith, says he has resumed work in his shop as
life readjusts itself. He says ISIL have removed
the huge blast walls from the streets as well as
checkpoints in an attempt to ease traffic in the
city.
"ISIL treat us in a nice way. There is no harass-
ment, even for women. Prices for foodstuffs are
less," he said, although he added that govern-
ment salaries are not being paid.
The hearts and minds campaign in Mosul mir-
rors ISIL's tactics in Syria, where it has exploit-
ed the power vacuum left by a three-year civil
war in order to take ground.
In the Syrian city of Raqqa, ISIL moved in with
other rebel battalions and started providing
food and money to locals. It was only once ISIL
had solidified its control of Raqqa did it open
courts which imposed public executions and
amputations.
Then it violently evicted the rebel groups that
helped it take Raqqa and destroyed religious
shrines.
In Mosul, unveiled women still walk through
the streets and ISIL has stayed away from
Christian churches, including the Tomb of
Jonah.
However, militants razed the tomb of Ibn al-
Athir, an Arab philosopher, according to eye-
witnesses, and state television announced on
Wednesday that ISIL had in fact threatened to
demolish Jonah's Tomb within three days.
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
ISIL are being aided by secular Baathists as well
as Sunni groups that disagree with their vision
of an Islamic Caliphate but share a deep hatred
for the Shi'ite-led government in Baghdad.
A member of the Islamic Army, a smaller insur-
gent group, said ISIL had agreed to run the city
in consultation with all Sunni groups through a
military council and that all decisions would be
consultative.
The different armed factions were debating who
to nominative for governor of the city, he added.
The favourites are thought to include several ex-
generals from Saddam Hussein's army.
U.S. SUPPORT?
A senior Iraqi security official who is involved in
decision making told Reuters that there was "no
clear strategy for the Iraqi government to retake
Mosul".
He said less than 100 ISIL fighters took the city
of two million, exploiting the collapse of the
army. Thousands of Iraqi soldiers abandoned
their posts when ISIL moved in to Mosul. The
military is riven with corruption and troops are
demoralised by poor leadership and sectarian
splits
"After (ISIL) controlled the city, they started
gaining the support of the city's people -- they
opened the roads, they removed the blast walls,
to help the people. To send them a message that
they are on the side of the people, that they are
different to the military," the source said on
condition of anonymity.
The security source said it would be impossible
to retake Mosul without U.S. support, which
would leave ISIL with territory from the Medi-
terranean coast in western Syria to a few miles
from Baghdad in eastern Iraq.
U.S. President Barack Obama is considering
military support to the government of Iraq but
says it is contingent on Prime Minister Nuri
al-Maliki's taking steps to broaden his Shi'ite-
dominated government, a move Maliki seems
unlikely to take.
Obama pulled out all U.S. troops in late 2011
and rules out sending them back, although he is
weighing other options such as air strikes.
Fathi Kashmoola, a 45-year-old resident of
Mosul, say he was unable to flee when the mili-
tants moved in because he could not move his
four disabled brothers. He says ISIL have not
harassed people but says he is anxious for his
future.
“We are living in a whirlpool ... it is, frankly, not
the life we would wish for. Most people near me
left expecting their areas to be shelled or mor-
tared," he said.
Usama Hassan, a university lecturer, summed
up the dilemma of those who remained: "We are
stuck in between the government's hammer and
insurgents anvil."
(Additional reporting by Raheem Salman and
Isra' Al-Rubei'i in Baghdad; Writing by Oliver
Holmes; Editing by Giles Elgood)
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
Iraq seeks U.S. air power
against militants - officials
Reuters, June 19, 2014
J
EDDAH (Reuters) - Iraq has requested
U.S. air power to try to reverse rapid ter-
ritorial gains by Sunni Muslim insurgents,
U.S. and Iraqi officials said on Wednesday.
Iraq Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told re-
porters Iraq had asked for air strikes "to break
the morale" of the Islamic State of Iraq and the
Levant (ISIL) which has captured cities and
towns in the north in a lightning advance over
the past week.
He added that Iraq's ally, Shi'ite Muslim power
Iran, had so far not intervened to help the Bagh-
dad government but "everything is possible".
In Washington, General Martin Dempsey, the
chairman of the U.S. military’s Joint Chiefs of
Staff, acknowledged to Congress on Wednesday
that Iraq had sought U.S. air support, but gave
no details of the request.
“We have a request from the Iraqi government
for air power,” Dempsey told a hearing.
Asked whether the United States should hon-
our that request, Dempsey answered indirectly,
saying: “It is in our national security interest to
counter ISIL wherever we find them.”
Speaking after a meeting of Arab foreign min-
isters in Jeddah in Saudi Arabia, Zebari said
air power was needed to start to roll back gains
by the insurgents, who have captured large
amounts of weaponry from the Iraqi army dur-
ing their advance.
"I explained to our Arab brothers in the meet-
ing, that Iraq officially requested the United
States’ help according to the ... strategic agree-
ment between Iraq and the United States of
America, to direct air strikes (on) some of the
group’s vital targets to break this state of morale
now present, and to ... begin the operation of
defeating them," he said.
Zebari also criticised what he said was the lack
of a condemnation by Riyadh of massacres by
ISIL.
Iraq has accused Sunni power Saudi Arabia of
backing the group, a charge strongly denied by
Riyadh, which designated ISIL a terrorist or-
ganisation last month.
"The first reaction that we heard from the king-
dom after the events in Iraq, was that it was all
due to exclusionary (policies) and sectarianism
(by the Iraqi government). There was no refer-
ence to...the slaughter, the bloodletting and the
killing,” Zebari said.
(Reporting by Amena Bakr and Yara Bayoumy;
Writing by William Maclean; Editing by Ralph
Boulton)
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
The Crisis Through An Indian Prism

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

Forty Indian construction
workers kidnapped in Iraq
Reuters, June 19, 2014
N
EW DELHI (Reuters) - Forty Indian
construction workers have been kid-
napped in Iraq's second largest city of
Mosul, which fell to Sunni insurgents last week,
India's foreign ministry said on Wednesday.
The identity of the kidnappers and the wherea-
bouts of the workers are unknown, foreign min-
istry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin told a news
briefing. No ransom demand has been received.
Islamist militants have long considered India a
target. A recent al Qaeda video called on Indian
Muslims to follow the example of Syria and Iraq
and launch a jihad, or holy war, against the New
Delhi government.
On Monday, India's new government issued
a strong condemnation of the insurgency and
said it stood firmly by Baghdad, breaking from
India's traditionally nuanced diplomacy.
It was not immediately clear why Indian work-
ers were targeted.
"The Red Crescent confirmed to us that as per
their information, 40 Indian construction work-
ers have been kidnapped," Akbaruddin said.
"We won't leave any stone unturned to help
every single Indian national."
Militants from the Islamic State in Iraq and the
Levant (ISIL), along with other Sunni rebels,
are reported to have abducted dozens of for-
eigners as they swept through towns in the
Tigris valley north of Baghdad in recent days.
Sixty people including workers from Turkey,
Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Turkmenistan
have been taken from a hospital construction
site near the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, Turkey's
Dogan news agency said.
Insurgents seized eighty Turkish nationals in-
cluding diplomats, soldiers and children work-
ers in Mosul last week.
Most of the Indian hostages are from the north
Indian state of Punjab and were working for a
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
Baghdad-based company called Tariq Noor Al The Red Crescent, a humanitarian group, has
Huda, Akbaruddin said. contacted the nurses and is providing assist-
ance, Akbaruddin said.

STRANDED NURSES ISIL fighters, who aim to establish a Mus-

A former employee told Reuters the company
had told him the Indians were now safe and
being moved towards Kurdish controlled areas
of Iraq. Reuters was not able to independently
confirm this or contact the company directly.
lim caliphate across the Iraqi-Syrian frontier,
launched their revolt by seizing Mosul and have
since swept through the Tigris valley towards
Baghdad.

The sister of one of the men abducted said he (Additional reporting by Sruthi Gottipati,
had been out of contact since last Sunday. Shyamantha Asokan Malini Menon and Manoj
Kumar; Editing by Douglas Busvine and Tom
"His phone has been switched off. We are tense Heneghan)
and are wondering what happened to him,"
Gurpender Kaur told TV news channel CNN-
IBN. "Until then, at least we were able to speak
for a second or two, but now even that is not (Additional reporting by Sruthi Gottipati, Ma-
possible." lini Menon and Manoj Kumar; Editing by Doug-
las Busvine and Jeremy Laurence)
About 10,000 Indian nationals work in Iraq,
mostly in areas unaffected by the fighting be-
tween the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
(ISIL) and the national army. About 100 Indian
workers are trapped in areas overrun by ISIL,
Akbaruddin said.

The Indian government has contact with many

of them, including 46 nurses, and has sent a
senior envoy to Baghdad to support repatriation
efforts.

The nurses are stranded in Tikrit, which is un-

der militant control, with many of them holed
up in the hospital where they work. Nurses who
spoke to the Indian media said they had been
treating people wounded in fierce street fight-
ing.

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

Why the kidnapping of Indians in
Iraq is Modi’s first major crisis
Rajeev Sharma, June 18, 2014
N
arendra Modi, faced with the first ma-
jor crisis erupting from foreign shores
since he took over as Indian Prime
Minister on 26 May, held consultations with his
security and foreign policy experts on Wednes-
day after it became clear that 40 Indian con-
struction workers were kidnapped from Mosul,
Iraq. What worsens the situation further is that
there is no ransom call yet from the kidnappers.
The Prime Minister is understood to have asked
his National Security Advisor Ajit Doval to tap
all sources in ensuring that the kidnapped per-
sons are rescued and brought back unharmed.
Needless to say, the focus here is on the word
‘rescue’.
For Doval too this is the first major challenge in
his new avatar as NSA. The former chief of the
Intelligence Bureau (IB), who supervised IB’s
operations for decades, is no bunny in this area.
The government is all clammed up on the issue.
Ministry of External Affairs spokesman Syed
Akbaruddin confirmed on Thursday afternoon
that 40 Indians in Mosul had been abducted,
based on information received from interna-
tional agencies. However, Akbaruddin refused
to answer any of the ‘W’s — who did it; when it
happened; why and how; and where the hos-
tages are being kept.
He repeatedly said that he could not divulge
“any operational details” and added that the
details were so scanty and trickling in so slowly
that "Even the International Red Crescent is not
aware of their location".
Significantly, when Akbaruddin was asked
whether the Indian authorities, who were in
touch with various humanitarian and interna-
tional agencies, could guarantee the safety and
well-being of the kidnapped Indians, he said the
situation was very tenuous and no guarantees
could be given.
When this writer asked him one-on-one after
his briefing whether the Indian construction
workers were kidnapped while they were be-
ing evacuated to be taken to a safe place and
whether it was a botched up evacuation opera-
tion, Akbaruddin reiterated that he was not in
a position to speak anything about operational
issues.
The MEA briefing was largely called for giv-
ing updates about the visiting Russian deputy
Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin’s four-hour
talks with External Affairs Minister Sushma
Swaraj. In fact Swaraj was still in an adjoining
room even after the briefing was over. Eventu-
ally, the largely attended MEA briefing was
overshadowed by the Iraq crisis.
Asked about the update on the 40 nurses from
Kerala who are trapped in Tikrit, Akbaruddin
said, "We have requested the Red Crescent to
try and contact them and assure their security
and welfare. Red Crescent said that they had
gone met there and told them in the communi-
cation that it is not appropriate to take a surface
route."
The magnitude of the crisis that is staring in the
face of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is reflect-
ed by the fact that major powers are constantly
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
revising their plans and strategies in Iraq.
The United States, for example, which ear-
lier actively considered launching air raids on
terrorists’ locations in Iraq is now reportedly
backtracking. The reason is that while air raids
sound good on paper and make great news for
TV channels, such actions can go awry because
of inaccurate intelligence.
The voices emanating from these two major
powers and stakeholders put it in perspective
how the kidnappings of 40 Indian nationals,
perhaps by suspected ISIS militants, is a serious
challenge for Prime Minister Modi and his most
dependable asset Ajit Doval.
The writer is a Firstpost columnist and a stra-
tegic analyst who tweets @Kishkindha.

Hours later, President Barack Obama will be

holding a bipartisan meeting with Democratic
and Republican lawmakers to thrash out a
comprehensive approach in Iraq but till then he
has put on hold the idea of launching air raids
on militants’ targets in Iraq and focus on shar-
ing real time intelligence with Iraqi government
instead.

Saudi Arabia, a major stakeholder and a vested

interest party in Iraq, the region and the en-
tire Islamic world, has rocked the boat further
and warned of a high-stakes war ahead in Iraq.
Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal
was quoted as saying on Wednesday in Jeddah
that the ongoing turbulence in Iraq "carries
warning signs of a civil war with unpredictable
consequences for the region."

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

 Negotiation to evacuation: What India
must do to save citizens in Iraq
FP Staff, June 19, 2014
T
he Ministry of Home Affairs confirmed
on Wednesday that 40 Indian workers
had been kidnapped in Iraq. The work-
ers, mostly from Punjab and parts of north
India, were workers with a construction com-
pany in the Mosul town of Iraq, External Affairs
Ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin said.
Meanwhile, there are about 600 people from
Telangana currently in Iraq. Deputy Chief
Minister Mohammed Mehmood Ali said on
Wednesday said the state government was in
touch with the Ministry of External Affairs and
was gathering information about those from
Telangana feared trapped in Iraq.
Former diplomat KC Singh said during a debate
in CNN-IBN, "In the fog of a civil war you will
get conflicting news so we don't know what the
reality is. The government needs to first sort
out the real facts. The ministry has sent Suresh
Reddy who has excellent contacts. He would be
talking to the Saudis and the Qataris because
they were involved with ISIS in the past. Indian
military assets cant do anything. We have to
send planes to only get the people out of Bagh-
dad."
As the kin of those who are stranded in Iraq
are crying for help, Punjab CM Parkash Singh
Badal even went to the extent of saying that he
is ready to pay ransom to get back the workers
belonging to Punjab. Singh countered that this
was the wrong approach. "Don't speak of ran-
som. Use other assets. Governments, when they
say are willing to pay ransom, in future becomes
prey because others can be picked up for ran-
som."
Meanwhile, retired Commodore MR Khan said,
"There are a number of groups operating in the
region. One thing which is in our favour is that
ISIS is trying to establish that everything is nor-
mal. It is unlikely that they would mistreat the
Indian hostages."
"I don't think ISIS is going to make any more
enemies. I think this situation is not as hopeless
as it might appear on the surface. Because the
situation is confused, much of the trouble is be-
cause of the Iraqi government. I don't think the
Iraqi govt will have any clout with ISIS. It will
have to be through humanitarian groups that
we negotiate," he added.
Vijay Prashad of the American University in
Beirut said, "ISIS has a track record of kidnap-
ping foreigners and taking ransom. It is really
important that the Indian government stays in
touch with the International Red Cresent. It is a
good time to make a phone call to Riyadh."
It is not just the 40 kidnapped workers. Over
10,000 Indians are estimated to be currently
living in Iraq. The MEA Spokesperson said
around 100 Indians are in violence-hit areas. In
such a situation, does India busy itself in nego-
tiations to free those kidnapped or evacuate the
others?
"The crisis had been building for a week. We
wake up after things happen. If we have a large
worker population in a volatile area then we
have to keep a track of where they are," said
Singh.
Also, he said, "We have to function on both
negotiating and evacuation. The people don't
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
voluntarily want to move, but the government
has to take a call and make sure they move out.
At least have a fall back protocol."
India has military assets in the Gulf that may
be needed for evacuation. Khan said, "This
geo-political crisis cannot last too long and ISIS
doesn't have capability to occupy Baghdad.
Much before that some kind of intervention
from US is likely. Our naval ship can go and
evacuate only once the negotiation is done."
Firstpost in a report had said, for India, the Iraq
crisis could have serious consequences as the
Middle-eastern country is the second largest
supplier of crude oil to India. If the Iraqi mili-
tary fails to prevent fighters from taking over
Baghdad and southern Iraq, the global crude oil
market will see some serious upheavals. Thus,
New Delhi can little afford to be at ease.
Khan said, "The oil angle is very important. Oil
market operates on sentiments. Even if there is
a small shortage oil prices tend to spike and this
would not be liked by the western countries.
And I think they would make sure that the ISIS
would be stopped before they reach those oil
wells."
The Iraq government asked the United States
Wednesday to carry out air strikes against Sun-
ni jihadists who attacked the country's main oil
refinery and seized more territory in the north.
The appeal came as fighters from the Islamic
State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) were press-
ing a week-long offensive that has brought them
close to the capital."
Prashad said, "The US has said that airstrikes
would be counter productive. I wouldn't hold
my breath for the US cavalry to ride in. The
pressure on Baghdad is very great. It may not
fall to ISIS, but may fall prey to major trouble."
"I would strongly recommend that the Indian
government should evacuate Indians and there
is no point waiting. I think it should have begun
already. It is a scandal that evacuation has not
started," he said.
Meanwhile Khan was of the opinion that nego-
tiations must be done first. "They must negoti-
ate from whatever channels available to find out
which group is holding. Once that is done we
should immediately divert our ships to evacuate
our people."
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
 Send us home or to another
place: Kerala nurses in Tikrit
IANS, June 19, 2014

T
hiruvananthapuram: The 46 Kerala
nurses stranded in strife-torn Tikrit town
in northern Iraq on Wednesday asked
the Indian embassy officials to either take them
home or change their place of work.
eagerly waiting to hear good news. We are sit-
ting in our rooms, as we have no idea of media
reports of 40 Indians being kidnapped from
Mosul It's about 60 km from here. For the past
two days, we did not hear any sound of explo-
sions. We are all praying," added the nurse.

The office of Kerala Chief Minister Oommen

Chandy told IANS it is in touch with the exter-
nal affairs ministry in Delhi, which is giving
directions to the embassy officials.

Speaking to IANS over phone from Tikrit, the

hometown of deposed and executed Iraqi dic-
tator Saddam Hussein now under control of
Sunni militants, a Kerala nurse said the Indian
embassy officials speak to them over phone
every day and find out if they have taken food
while also enquiring about their safety.

"Yesterday (Tuesday), a Red Cross official first

came and spoke to us. Later, another official
came and took our details. We have told them
and the embassy officials that either we be given
a job in a place away from Tikrit or get a safe
passage back to Kerala," said the nurse, not will-
ing to be identified.

Of the 46 nurses, 30 reached Tikrit last August

while the rest arrived in February.

Following a change in the local government

in Tikrit, their contractual obligations have
changed and now they have been promised pay
of just $200 a month while earlier it was $750
per month.

"We are staying put in our residence here and

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
Iraq: Govt taking steps to ensure
safety of 600 Telangana workers
IANS, June 18, 2014

H
yderabad: There are about 600 people
from Telangana in Iraq and the gov-
ernment is taking all steps to ensure
their safety, Telangana Deputy Chief Minister
Mohammed Mehmood Ali said Wednesday.
their respective districts are trapped in Iraq and
if they require any help including evacuation.
The collectors were asked to collect details like
passport numbers, address in Iraq and contact
numbers so that the state government can get
in touch with the ministry of external affairs for
assistance.

He said the state government was in touch with

the ministry of external affairs and was gather-
ing information about those from Telangana
feared trapped in Iraq.

Ali told reporters here that the government has

so far identified 600 workers from Telangana.
He said Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhara Rao
was in regular touch with the central govern-
ment.

Earlier, Information Technology Minister

Tarakarama Rao said the government would
take all necessary steps to safely bring back the
Telanganites trapped in Iraq.

The state government has already opened a hel-

pline in NRI cell to provide information about
the workers from the state trapped in Iraq and
to render assistance.

The helpline numbers opened in the state secre-

tariat are 040-23220603 and 9440854433.

The state government has also asked all district

collectors to find out if workers/migrants from
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
 Unable to contact those stranded
in Iraq despite efforts: MEA
June 18, 2014

N
ew Delhi: Forty Indian employees
stranded in violence-hit Iraq are "un-
contactable", the foreign ministry said
on Wednesday, with a newspaper reporting the
construction workers have been kidnapped.
The Times of India, citing unnamed sources,
said the 40, who were working on various
projects, were abducted by the militants during
an evacuation of the Mosul area.
Since launching their offensive on June 9, the
jihadist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
(ISIL) has captured Mosul and a big chunk of
mainly-Sunni Arab territory stretching south
towards the capital.

As many as 46 Indian nurses were also stranded

in Iraq waiting for the turmoil to subside.

Several have told NDTV and other Indian televi-

sion stations by phone that they were living like
prisoners at a state-run hospital in Tikrit city
after being abandoned by their employers as
well as the military.

A ministry spokesman said he could not confirm
the report in the Times of India that insurgents
have abducted the 40 workers in the northern
city of Mosul amid a deteriorating security situ-
ation.
The offensive has displaced hundreds of thou-
sands of people and sent jitters through world
oil markets as the militants have advanced ever
nearer to Baghdad, leaving the Shiite-led gov-
ernment in disarray.

"Despite our best efforts at this stage we haven't

been able to contact them. So they remain un-
contactable at this stage," said spokesman Syed
Akbaruddin told reporters.

"Beyond that I am not able to confirm or verify

reports of a speculative nature (kidnapping),"
Akbaruddin added.

"At this stage we have no reports whatsoever,

no confirmation, no verification of any Indian
national being involved in any violent accident
or injury."

The Indian foreign ministry has set up a 24-

hour control room in New Delhi to provide in-
formation on Iraq and was dispatching a former
envoy to the country to assist its embassy in
Baghdad.

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

Iraq crisis: Is India prepared
to foot high crude oil bills?
FP Staff, June 18, 2014
F
or India, the Iraq crisis could have seri-
ous consequences as the Middle-eastern
country is the second largest supplier of
crude oil to India. If the Iraqi military fails to
prevent the Islamic State of Iraq and the Le-
vant (Isis) fighters from taking over Baghdad
and run over southern Iraq, the global crude oil
market will see some serious upheavals. Thus,
New Delhi can little afford to be at ease.
"If the Isis moves south, the crude oil can spike
to $150-160 a barrel. The oil market is funda-
mentally volatile. Opec produces 60 percent
of the global crude output. But it is redrawing it-
self with sanctions in member nations like Iran
and Syria. There are serious geo-political up-
heavals in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia cannot
fill the gap if the crude supply from Iraq is dis-
turbed," Shell India, former chairman, Vikram
Mehta told CNN-IBN during a panel discussion.
The Hindu, associate editor, Strategic Affairs,
Atul Aneja agreed that the situation in the
southern oilfields is key to the whole crisis.
"The game changer would be the southern oil-
fields of Rumaila, Majnoon and Halhfaya oil-
fields. If the crude oil price reaches $150-$160 a
barrel, India would be badly hit. The identity of
Iraq has diminished greatly. The Shias, Shun-
nis and the Kurds are all trying to assert them-
selves. We had a good relationship with Iran
but that got affected due to external pressure.
We need to have an independent energy policy,"
said Aneja.
Former deputy national security adviser Leela
Ponappa hoped that the government would un-
derstand the gravity of the situation.
"This is a serious crisis going on Iraq. Iraq itself
never stabilised after two Gulf wars. The gov-
ernment needs to prepare for a very serious
situation. Iran is the fulcrum of the entire situ-
ation in Middle East. But we had hiccups in our
relationship with Iran. India needs to have good
relationship Sudan, Mozambique, Vietnam and
Russia for our energy security," Ponappa said.
BJP, energy cell, national convener, Narendra
Taneja sounded more optimistic.
"Southern Iraq and Iran, which borders the
region is a Shia majority area. The good thing
is the Shia community is supporting the gov-
ernment. But we don't need to press the panic
button as yet. The government is already tak-
ing some steps and that includes conservation
too. Whatever is happening in Iraq, India can
do very little to control it. Having said that the
Centre is putting a contingency plan in place,"
Taneja said.
The former chief of Shell India felt that energy
is a very tricky area for the new government at
the Centre.
"Energy and oil pricing is a government's deep-
est dilemma. This can't be resolved by com-
pletely losing track of the market. Crude price
has to be aligned with the market. The subsidies
have to be cushioned by the exchequer. The oil
firms cannot bear the brunt of it. There is no
substitute but the price of oil has to be market-
oriented at this juncture. If the southern oil
fields in Iraq are hit, it would dramatically affect
Iraq's export capabilities. The Centre has to do
something to scale back subsidies. The govern-
Copyright © 2012 Firstpost
ment can no longer undermine the balance
sheets of public sector oil firms and must pump
in money for exploration and production of
hydrocarbon assets," Mehta said.

Ex-petroleum minister Mani Shankar Aiyar felt

that the Centre is fast running out of options. "If
all oil-producing Asian nations come together,
then the situation can be handled better. Hav-
ing said that when prices of petroleum products
shoot up exponentially, the government would
have to take exponential measures to protect its
citizens. The window of opportunity is fast clos-
ing for the BJP government. Fear is the confla-
gration between Shia and Sunni would eat up
the whole of the Middle East," Aiyar said.

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

How the continuing Iraq crisis
will impact India’s economy
Amit Bhandari, June 17, 2014

T
he unrest in Iraq caused by the seizure of
major cities in the country by the mili-
tant group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria
(ISIS) will impact India financially but will not
translate into a shortage of petroleum products.
because the selling price is less than the cost.
The government provides subsidies to make
up for their losses. A higher oil price will mean
increased losses and a bigger subsidy bill for the
government.

However, the impact will not result in a short-

age of petroleum products. India’s oil imports
are processed to produce fuels such as diesel,
petrol, LPG and kerosene – far in excess of what
is consumed domestically. Therefore, it is highly
unlikely that there will be a shortage of petro-
leum products in the Indian market.

Amit Bhandari is the energy and environment

fellow at Gateway House: Indian Council on
Global Relations

Crude oil prices have risen in response to the

ongoing unrest. The price of the Indian crude
oil basket was $110.54/barrel on 13 June, 2014
– up from $106.88/barrel at the beginning of
the month. India imports close to 2 million
barrels/day of crude oil – so a rise in prices will
lead to a higher import bill.

The bulk of Iraq’s oil production comes from

three oil fields – north Rumaila and south
Rumaila in the southern part, and Kirkuk in
the north. The southern fields account for ap-
proximately three-fourths of the country's total
oil production. Exports from Kirkuk have been
halted since March after the infrastructure
was sabotaged. Presently, the ISIS is strong in
northern Iraq, so there is no immediate risk to
oil exports from the southern fields.

India’s state- owned oil marketing companies,

Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL)
Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited
(HPCL), and Indian Oil Corporation Limited
(IOCL) sustain huge losses on the sale of retail
fuels such as diesel, petrol, LPG and kerosene

Copyright © 2012 Firstpost

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