Iraqi planes won’t strike civilian areas
Order seen as effort to reassure Sunni minority
IRBIL, Iraq – Iraq’s new prime minister said Saturday that his nation’s warplanes would no longer attack areas where civilians are present, a step meant to ease tensions between the Shiite Muslim-dominated central government and the Sunni Muslim minority.
“I have ordered the Iraqi air force to halt shelling of civilian areas even in those towns controlled by ISIS,” Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announced on his official Twitter account, using a common acronym for the extremist Islamic State group.
The Iraqi government is waging a wide-scale military campaign against the al-Qaida breakaway faction, which has overrun large parts of Iraqi territory. The campaign has included airstrikes and artillery bombardment targeting largely Sunni zones under Islamic State control, including the cities of Tikrit, Fallujah and Mosul.
Human rights groups and Sunni leaders have said scores of civilians have been killed and many others injured in the aerial assaults. Some Sunnis have alleged that the bombings were indiscriminate.
Many fear that the attacks have hardened strengthened support among rank-and-file Sunnis for the Islamic State, which projects itself as a defender of Sunni Muslims. Despite its extreme ideology, many Sunnis have welcomed the Islamic State as a bulwark against abuses by Shiite-led security forces that they regard as sectarian enforcers.
The prime minister’s decision was viewed widely as an effort to reach out to the disenfranchised Sunni minority. The United Nations praised the order.
“Protection of civilians and ensuring their safety and security is a paramount priority,” Nickolay Mladenov, the top U.N. official in Iraq, said in a statement.
The United States also has launched more than 150 airstrikes in Iraqi territory in support of the government offensive against the Islamic State. It was not immediately clear if and how Abadi’s declaration might affect U.S. operations.
Some Sunni leaders expressed qualified support of the new limits on Iraqi government airstrikes, though many remain distrustful of Abadi’s administration.
The new prime minister replaced fellow Shiite Nouri al-Maliki, who was accused of stoking sectarian tensions and marginalizing the Sunni population.
The Obama administration pushed for Maliki’s exit and applauded Abadi’s ascension to the prime minister’s post. Abadi has pledged to build an inclusive government in Iraq and to reach out to minorities. He faces many hurdles in the deeply divided nation.
It was not publicly known if Baghdad was contemplating alternative strategies to aerial attacks, such as enhanced use of artillery.