Qassem Al Araji treads carefully with results of probe into PM Kadhimi’s attempted assassination

In a press conference on 29 November, Iraq’s national security chief Qassem Al Araji published the results of a probe he conducted into the attempted assassination of Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhimi in a drone attack on his residence in Baghdad’s Green Zone last month.  Al Araji, a member of the Badr Organisation, part of the Popular Mobilization Forces, was careful not to specify names to avoid angering pro-Shi’ite militia groups that continue to target the zone.

No conclusions

In the report, Al Araji, who succeeded the powerful Faleh Al Fayad as national security adviser earlier this year, went into some detail about the 7 November drone attack which, conducted in two separate strikes, was intended to bring the prime minister out of his home so that he could be assassinated. The report, released by Al Araji along with Hamid Al Shatri, the number two of the National Security Service, headed by Abdul Ghani Al Asadi , and Majid Al Dulaimi, the deputy director of the Iraqi National Intelligence Service (INIS), gives nothing away about the identity of the perpetrators of the attack. However there are indications that it was the work of the strongly pro-Iranian Asa’ib Ahl Al Haq – the League of the Righteous . On 1 December the militia group’s chief Qais Al Khazali described the probe as a “manipulation and a waste of time”.

Foreign troop withdrawal

Concerned not to exacerbate the already high tensions in Iraq, Al Araji chose to make a gesture towards the Shi’ite militia groups, meeting Lieutenant-General Michael Lollesgaard the Danish commander of NATO in Iraq the day after the report was published to convey his desire that US and other foreign forces leave Iraq. This would comply not only with the parliamentary decision voted in the wake of the assassination of Qassem Suleimani on 5 January last year, but also with the wishes of Iraq’s pro-Iranian militia groups.