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Militants seize Jordan border crossing as Kerry, Iraqi PM meet

BAGHDAD — Sunni militants seized the border crossing between Iraq and Jordan yesterday, raising the spectre of an insurgency that could spread to the rest of the region, as the American Secretary of State arrived on a surprise visit to urge Baghdad to move away from divisive politics.

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BAGHDAD — Sunni militants seized the border crossing between Iraq and Jordan yesterday, raising the spectre of an insurgency that could spread to the rest of the region, as the American Secretary of State arrived on a surprise visit to urge Baghdad to move away from divisive politics.

Washington — which withdrew its troops from Iraq in 2011 after an occupation that followed the 2003 invasion that toppled dictator Saddam Hussein — has been struggling to help Iraq’s Shia-led government contain a Sunni insurgency led by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), an Al Qaeda offshoot that seized northern towns this month.

At the start of a series of meetings with representatives of various Iraqi factions yesterday, Mr John Kerry met Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and other senior Iraqi officials. Speaking to reporters after the meeting which lasted one hour and 40 minutes, Mr Kerry said that US support for Iraqi security forces will be intense and sustained to help them combat the Islamist insurgency.

“The key today was to get from each of the government leaders a clarity with respect to the road forward in terms of government formation,” Mr Kerry said. “Indeed, Prime Minister Maliki firmly and on multiple occasions affirmed his commitment to July 1 (to form the new government).”

The closed-door meeting between Mr Kerry and Mr Maliki had not been expected to be friendly, given that officials in Washington had floated suggestions that the Iraqi Premier should resign as a necessary first step towards quelling the vicious uprising.

Washington is worried Mr Maliki’s government has fuelled the Iraq insurgency by alienating moderate Sunnis who once fought Al Qaeda, but have now joined the ISIS revolt.

While Washington has been careful not to say publicly it wants Mr Maliki to relinquish power, Iraqi officials have said such a message has been delivered behind the scenes.

Iraqi officials briefed on Mr Kerry’s talks with the Iraqi Prime Minister said Mr Maliki urged Washington to target the militants’ positions in Iraq and neighbouring Syria, citing training camps and convoys, with air strikes. The officials said Mr Kerry responded by saying a great deal of care and caution must be taken before attacks are launched to avoid civilian casualties that could create the impression that Americans are attacking Sunnis.

US President Barack Obama agreed last week to send up to 300 special forces troops as advisers, but has held off on approving air strikes and ruled out redeploying ground troops.

After meeting Mr Maliki, Mr Kerry yesterday met Mr Ammar Hakim, an influential Shia cleric and leader of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, a Shia political party that is a rival of Mr Maliki’s political coalition.

He later met Mr Osama Nujaifi, one of Iraq’s top-ranking Sunnis, who is also the Speaker of the Iraqi Parliament. “The principal concern is for the Iraqi people — for the integrity of the country, its borders, for its sovereignty,” Mr Kerry told Mr Nujaifi during the meeting.

Mr Nujaifi, who is from Mosul, which was overrun earlier this month by militants, described the Islamist extremists as a threat to the entire world. “We have to confront it through direct military operations (and) political reforms so that we can inject a new hope into our own people,” he said.

A day earlier, Mr Kerry said Iraq had reached a “critical moment” and urged leaders to rise above sectarian disputes to create a new government that gives more power to Sunnis and Kurds. Both groups accuse Mr Maliki of blocking them from holding equal authority in what is designed as a power-sharing government.

Meanwhile, Mr Obama, in a round of television interviews that aired yesterday in the US, said Mr Maliki and the Iraqi leadership face a test as to whether “they are able to set aside their suspicions, their sectarian preferences for the good of the whole”.

“The one thing I do know is that if they fail to do that, then no amount of military action by the United States can hold that country together,” Mr Obama added.

Sunni tribes yesterday took the Turaibil desert border crossing, the only legal crossing point between Iraq and Jordan, after Iraqi security forces fled, Iraqi and Jordanian security sources said. Tribal leaders were negotiating to hand the post to Sunni Islamists from ISIS, who have taken two main crossings with Syria in recent days and pushed the Shia-led government’s forces back towards Baghdad.

Ethnic Kurdish forces control a third border post with Syria in the north, leaving government troops with no presence along the entire 800km western frontier, which includes some of the most important trade routes in the Middle East. AGENCIES

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