BAGHDAD // Pentagon chief Ashton Carter held talks in Baghdad on Thursday on Iraq’s war against ISIL, whose “caliphate” is shrinking but is increasing its frequency of deadly car bombings.
His visit came as Iraqi troops, some of which were trained by the United States, tightened the noose on ISIL in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province that the government lost in May.
On his first visit since taking office as defence secretary earlier this year, Mr Carter met Iraq prime minister Haider Al Abadi and some of the 3,500 US troops being deployed in the country.
Iraqi forces are being bolstered in their efforts to recapture the key city of Ramadi from ISIL by US-trained troops.
Mr Carter was briefed on the effect of the US training mission on a stalled Iraqi offensive to retake the city, which fell to militants in May.
He also met top Sunni politicians, including the parliament speaker, Salim Al Juburi, and officials from Anbar and Nineveh, the two regions where ISIL has its largest footprint.
Any attempt to take back Mosul, the capital of Nineveh and the largest city in the caliphate that ISIL proclaimed over parts of Iraq and Syria last year, has been put on hold.
The Iraqi government has instead focused on Anbar, a vast western province that stretches from the country’s borders with Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, all the way to the outskirts of Baghdad.
Coalition aircraft, which have carried out thousands of airstrikes in Iraq and Syria during the past year, have lately been hitting dozens of targets in Anbar every week.
“Iraqi security forces are in the process of encircling” Ramadi, said Pentagon spokesman Col Steve Warren who is travelling with Mr Carter.
He put the number of militant fighters defending the city at 1,000 to 2,000.
He would not say when he thought a drive to wrest the city back from ISIL might be launched in earnest, but said it should be a matter of “weeks”.
US military advisers have trained 9,000 Iraqi soldiers since their deployment but they had never seen front-line action until a first batch of 3,000 troops recently joined the Ramadi battle, Mr Warren said.
“This is a development we are very satisfied to hear,” he said in Baghdad.
Several hundred US troops are also helping Iraqi forces train local Sunni Arab tribesmen at Habbaniyah, a large base situated between Ramadi and the militants’ other Anbar bastion of Fallujah.
Mr Warren said 1,800 tribal fighters had already received training and equipment under the programme.
But Anbar tribal leaders want more from Washington.
“The coalition’s support to Anbar and its sheikhs is weak on all levels, mainly the humanitarian level and the security level when it come to support for the tribes in liberating their areas,” said Rafia Al Fahdawi, a tribal leader whose forces have been fighting alongside the government.
Baghdad’s other main partner in the fight against the ISIL is Tehran, which also has advisers on the ground and directly supports the powerful Shiite militias now playing a lead role in the military effort.
Iran is not part of the coalition, and while this month’s historic nuclear deal opened a new chapter in relations between Tehran and Washington, their coexistence on Iraq’s battlefield continues to remain uneasy.
The Iraqi army, backed by Washington, wants to take back Ramadi first.
The Hashed Al Shaabi, an umbrella organisation for Tehran-backed groups that Mr Al Abadi only nominally controls, however, has made Fallujah its priority.
After initially expanding after its proclamation of a caliphate over parts of Iraq and Syria last summer, the group led by Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, has witnessed the internationally supported Iraqi fightback roll back its borders.
The militants are also under pressure in Syria, where they have lost several key areas along the border with Turkey.
Observers have warned that as military pressure on ISIL mounted in the battlefield, the group risked reverting to its old tactics of hit-and-run attacks and car bombs.
The group claimed one of the biggest suicide car bomb attacks in Iraq’s bloody history last week when about 120 people were killed by a blast that ripped through a market in the town of Khan Bani Saad, just north of Baghdad.
The town is located in Diyala province, which has a border with Iran.
In January, the government announced it had “liberated” the town but it has since struggled to restore stability there.
The militants have also carried out a spate of car bomb attacks in the capital, the latest of which came on Wednesday evening.
ISIL issued a statement on an online militant forum yesterday that claimed responsibility for the two bombs that exploded in predominantly Shiite neighbourhoods.
The blasts killed at least 21 people.
Two other car bombs killed at least 23 people in Baghdad on Tuesday.
* Agence France-Presse
and Bloomberg News
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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Our legal advisor
Rasmi Ragy is a senior counsel at Charles Russell Speechlys, a law firm headquartered in London with offices in Europe, the Middle East and Hong Kong.
Experience: Prosecutor in Egypt with more than 40 years experience across the GCC.
Education: Ain Shams University, Egypt, in 1978.
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: HyperSpace
Started: 2020
Founders: Alexander Heller, Rama Allen and Desi Gonzalez
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: Entertainment
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Investment raised: $75 million from investors including Galaxy Interactive, Riyadh Season, Sega Ventures and Apis Venture Partners
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Business Insights
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PFA Premier League team of 2018-19
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If you go
Where to stay: Courtyard by Marriott Titusville Kennedy Space Centre has unparalleled views of the Indian River. Alligators can be spotted from hotel room balconies, as can several rocket launch sites. The hotel also boasts cool space-themed decor.
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Final scores
18 under: Tyrrell Hatton (ENG)
- 14: Jason Scrivener (AUS)
-13: Rory McIlroy (NIR)
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-11: David Lipsky (USA), Marc Warren (SCO)
-10: Tommy Fleetwood (ENG), Chris Paisley (ENG), Matt Wallace (ENG), Fabrizio Zanotti (PAR)
Match info
Premier League
Manchester United 2 (Martial 30', Lingard 69')
Arsenal 2 (Mustafi 26', Rojo 68' OG)
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
THE BIO
Bio Box
Role Model: Sheikh Zayed, God bless his soul
Favorite book: Zayed Biography of the leader
Favorite quote: To be or not to be, that is the question, from William Shakespeare's Hamlet
Favorite food: seafood
Favorite place to travel: Lebanon
Favorite movie: Braveheart
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The specs
Engine: 2-litre or 3-litre 4Motion all-wheel-drive Power: 250Nm (2-litre); 340 (3-litre) Torque: 450Nm Transmission: 8-speed automatic Starting price: From Dh212,000 On sale: Now
PROFILE BOX
Company name: Overwrite.ai
Founder: Ayman Alashkar
Started: Established in 2020
Based: Dubai International Financial Centre, Dubai
Sector: PropTech
Initial investment: Self-funded by founder
Funding stage: Seed funding, in talks with angel investors
