Iraqi Ambassador to the United States Fareed Yasseen discussed progress in Iraq Feb. 22, noting that the entire dynamic in the long-embattled country has dramatically changed from just four short years ago.
“The Iraqi army that has now defeated ISIS is not the Iraqi army of 2014; the governance structure of Iraq is different from what we had in 2014; the political discourse that we have is different from what we had prior to 2014,” he said at a Hudson Institute forum in Washington.
Yasseen emphasized that the Iraqi people have been a major catalyst.
“What happened between 2014 and now is really remarkable—it’s quasi-miraculous,” he said, noting that four years ago Baghdad was almost taken by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, and cities such as Erbil in the north were seriously threatened as well.
Yasseen also praised Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, the Iranian Shia leader in Iraq, who called on Iraqi citizens to fight to save their country.
“There is a sense of Iraqi empowerment that did not exist previously,” he said, noting high-level anxiety among the populace, particularly in the wake of other military interventions going back more than a decade and political conditions that were not positive in the aftermath. “From 2014 until now, the fighting has been done—and we have the casualties to prove it—was done almost entirely on the ground by Iraqis, obviously supported very ably by the coalition led by the United States.”
With the populace taking on more responsibilities, it has elevated the whole society as Iraqis approach a parliamentary election in May.
“One of the interesting things that are worth mentioning in these elections is the eagerness of people to have cross-sectarian, cross-ethnic coalitions,” Yasseen said. “In fact, this is a trend that has been consolidating over a period of time.”
The comprehensive 90-minute event addressed a number of military and political issues surrounding Iraq and a recent reconstruction conference held in Kuwait. Other participants of the forum were Michael Pregent, Hudson Institute adjunct fellow, Linda Robinson, senior international and defense researcher at RAND Corporation, and Jonas Parello-Plesner, Hudson Institute senior fellow.
The forum is available in its entirety at the Hudson Institute website.
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