MESOP BACKGROUNDER : “No Logic” in Excluding KRG from Global Coalition Meeting in US: Senior Kurdish official insists KRG should have been invited to tomorrows meeting in Washington as it is an effective force on the ground

  Sardar Sattar  – BasNews – 19 July 2016 – ERBIL — As the US-led coalition members fighting the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria are set to meet in Washington tomorrow, Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) says that there is “no logic” in excluding it from the meeting.

KRG’s Head of Department of Foreign Relations, Falah Mustafa, said on Tuesday that there is “no logic in excluding KRG from [the] global coalition meeting in US” which will be held on Wednesday, July 20th.He argued that while KRG is fighting on the forefront of the war against IS, and it is hosting 1.8 million IDPs and refugees, it should have been invited to the meeting.

46 foreign and defense ministers, from state members of the anti-IS coalition, will converge tomorrow in Washington “to coordinate the next phase of coalition campaign to defeat ISIL [IS],” according to Brett McGurk, a US special presidential envoy to the global coalition battling IS.Meetings will focus on military and stabilization planning for operations into IS’s heartland, including Mosul and Raqqa, McGurk posted on twitter. “Ministers will also focus on further degrading IS’s global networks, propaganda on-line, financial, and foreign fighters. Kurdish Peshmerga forces have played a vital role in the war against IS, with holding a 1050 kilometer-long frontline against IS militants in northern Iraq. More than 1,300 Peshmerga have lost their lives with over 8,000 others injure in combat.Despite severe financial crisis, KRG has also taken in nearly 2 million people who fled their homes due to the IS war in Syria and Iraq. www.mesop.de