Word: babikir
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...Maliki denounced the raid and promised nothing like it would happen again. Gen. Babikir, though, defended the operation, saying his soldiers do not launch raids in Sadr City - or anywhere else - without specific intelligence...
...three decades of opposition to the Saddam Hussein regime, Gen. Babikir Zibari worked as both a military commander and a political leader of the Kurdish Pesh Merga. So the top general in the new Iraqi Army knows better than most when a military question requires a political answer...
...That's where the politics come in. "We are hoping to see what the prime minister announces," Babikir said, referring to long-discussed plans for national reconciliation, which aims to disband Shi'ite militias and bring some Sunni insurgents into the political fold with a promise of amnesty. "This will support us, and enable us to deal with the situation a lot better than we have done in the past...
...Babikir's careful reply actually says quite a lot about the complex challenges he and his country face. After all, relying on Iraq's politicians to cement the tactical gains made by the American and Iraqi militaries is more a prayer than a strategy. Though the rail-thin officer downplayed the danger of militias affiliated with members of the government, like the Badr Organization and the Mahdi Army, many of the political opportunities cited by Babikir could just as easily be called part of the problem...
...General Babikir and the US military have been a bit more aggressive on that front than the government of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki would prefer. Earlier this month a joint US-Iraqi raid into Sadr City freed prisoners, at least some of the Sunnis, being held by what Babikir called an "assassination cell...