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Fallujah falls under Al-Qaeda control in blow for Iraq security
Key Iraqi city has fallen into the hands of Al-Qaeda group ISIL after days of fierce fighting
Armed tribesmen and Iraqi soldiers stand guard in a street as clashes rage on in the Iraqi city of Ramadi Photo: AFP
By AFP
9:12AM GMT 04 Jan 2014
The Iraqi government has lost control of Fallujah to Al-Qaeda-linked militants, a senior security official said
Saturday, after days of fighting sparked by an anti-government protest camp's removal.
Parts of the cities of Ramadi and Fallujah, west of Baghdad, have been held by militants for days, harkening back
to the years after the 2003 US-led invasion when both were insurgent strongholds.
Fighting erupted in the Ramadi area Monday, when security forces removed the main anti-government protest
camp set up after demonstrations broke out in late 2012 against what Sunni Arabs say is the marginalisation and
targeting of their community.
Anger at the Shiite-led government among the Sunni minority is seen as one of the main drivers of the worst
violence to hit Iraq in five years.
"Fallujah is under the control of ISIL," a senior security official in Anbar province told AFP, referring to
Al-Qaeda-linked group the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
However, the city's outskirts were in the hands of local police, the official added.
An AFP journalist in Fallujah also said that ISIL seemed to be in control, with no security forces or Sahwa
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anti-Al-Qaeda militiamen visible on the streets.
More than 100 people were killed on Friday during fighting in Ramadi and Fallujah, in the country's deadliest
single day in years.
Fourteen died in and near Ramadi on Monday and Tuesday, while later tolls were not immediately clear.
Hundreds of gunmen, some bearing the black flags often flown by jihadists, gathered at outdoor weekly Muslim
prayers in central Fallujah on Friday, a witness said.
One went to where the prayer leader had stood, and said: "We announce that Fallujah is an Islamic state and call
you to stand by our side."
Fallujah was the target of two major assaults after the 2003 invasion, in which American forces saw some of their
heaviest fighting since the Vietnam War.
American troops fought for years, aided by Sunni tribesmen in the Sahwa militia forces from late 2006, to wrest
control of Anbar from militants.
US forces suffered almost one-third of their total Iraq fatalities in Anbar, according to independent website
icasualties.org.
But two years after US forces withdrew from the country, the power of militants in the province is again rising.
Clashes erupted in the Ramadi area on Monday as security forces tore down the sprawling anti-government protest
camp.
The violence then spread to Fallujah, and a subsequent withdrawal of security forces from areas of both cities
cleared the way for ISIL to move in.
ISIL is the latest incarnation of an Al-Qaeda affiliate that lost ground from 2006, as Sunni tribesmen and former
insurgents allied with US troops against jihadists in a process that began in Anbar and came to be known as the
"Awakening".
But the extremist group has made a striking comeback following the US withdrawal and the outbreak of Syria's
civil war in 2011.
Charles Lister, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Doha Center, said its "strength and territorial control and
influence has been expanding in Anbar for some time", although mainly in rural desert areas.
The Ramadi protest camp operation pushed Sunni tribes into conflict with the government, and ISIL "has ridden
this wave of popular Sunni anger", Lister said.
Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki had long sought the closure of the protest camp, dubbing it a "headquarters for the
leadership of Al-Qaeda".
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But its removal has caused a sharp decline in the security situation.
And while the camp's closure has removed a physical sign of Sunni Arab grievances, the perceived injustices that
underpinned the protest have not been addressed.
Violence in Iraq last year reached a level not seen since 2008, when it was just emerging from a brutal period of
sectarian killings.
Sunni anger helped fuel the surge in unrest, boosting recruitment for militant groups and decreasing cooperation
with security forces, while the civil war in Syria also played a role, experts say.
Edited by Josie Ensor
Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2014
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