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Iraqi Official Says Syria Supporting Insurgents

May 11, 2007 12:15 PM

Iraqi_official__mnMowaffak al Rubaie, the national security advisor to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, told  ABC News Thursday that Syria is continuing to harbor and support Islamist militants responsible for killing both Iraqis and Americans.

Al Rubaie, who is in the United States for official meetings in Washington and at the United Nations in New York, said Iraqi officials had presented a detailed intelligence dossier to the Syrian government of insurgent activity on Syrian territory. The information included exact locations of terrorist training camps in Syria and the names, addresses and photographs of insurgent leaders living in Syria.

The Syrians have taken no action on the camps, and on the matter of the insurgents, the response is, "He's not in Syria," according to al Rubaie.

"Just like Ocalan," said al Rubaie, referring to the Kurdish militant Abdullah Ocalan, who staged attacks from bases in Syria against Turkey for 18 years until he was finally expelled in 1998 after Turkey massed troops on the border and threatened to go to war. "But we don't have the Turkish Army," added al Rubaie.

Iraq does have the U.S. Army, however, which is keenly aware that Syria has been the conduit for foreign militants for the past four years. 

In  a briefing on April 26, the Commander of Multi-National Forces in Iraq General David Petraeus stated, "Eighty to 90 percent of the suicide attacks are carried out by foreigners," brought into Iraq by a "network that typically brings them in through Syria." Most of the foreign fighters are Arab youths who are recruited in countries such as Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan and who then fly to the airport in Damascus where they link up with operatives to cross the border into Iraq. 

So far this year there have been more than 200 suicide attacks and car bombs that have killed more than 2,500 Iraqis. The majority of such attacks, which have often targeted soft civilian targets such as crowded marketplaces, are directed by al Qaeda in Iraq, according to U.S. and Iraqi officials, and have undermined the recent U.S. surge of forces in Baghdad.

Gen. Petraeus said the Syrians had to do more to "crack down" on the trafficking of militants into Iraq but stopped short of saying that Syrians were supporting the insurgents.

Wary of widening the war, the U.S. has been reluctant to threaten Syria with military force and has had limited diplomatic contacts with Syrian regime. "The United States should engage Syria," said al Rubaie.

In the first high-level contact with the Syrian government in more than two years, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem last week in Egypt and later told ABC News she talked to him about "the need to stop the flow of those foreign fighters, the biggest source...of suicide bombers."

In interviews and public statements, Syrian officials, including President Bashar al Assad, have insisted they are doing their best to stop the flow of insurgents across the border.

The Syrian Embassy in Washington today had no comment on the charge by al Rubaie that Syria had failed to act on specific intelligence provided by the Iraqi government.

On other matters, al Rubaie said he had productive meetings with members of Congress in Washington, but he was concerned some members held "entrenched" views dictated more by domestic U.S. politics than by the "reality on the ground in Iraq."

On security, al Rubaie said that there had been "spectacular" progress against insurgents in al Anbar province and "good" progress in reducing sectarian violence in Baghdad.

Regarding the lack of political progress in passing legislation to reconcile the various Iraqi factions and the prospect that the Iraqi Council of Representatives is planning to take a two-month vacation this summer, al Rubaie insisted progress was being made and that the government had convinced the Council to cancel their July vacation.  "We're working on August," he added. 

Al Rubaie said a precipitous U.S. withdrawal from Iraq would be disastrous and would cede victory to the terrorists. "Iraq is the central front in a global ideological fight" against extremism, he said, indicating that a loss in Iraq would be a major strategic defeat for Iraq and the West.

May 11, 2007 | Permalink | User Comments (13)

User Comments

All of these countries in the middle east are backwards. Diplomacy does not work with these uneducated clowns, I feel sorry for all people that are stuck in these ruthless societies and have to continue to live in these nasty places. Only when people will be able to live freely then their might be peace but while there is continued hate being preached then what can we do, nothing but blame bush. Very sad to see what the world is turning into with fewer and fewer people taking the side of freedom but the sides of these clowns that are in power positions in the mid east. I believe radical islam will lead to the end of civilization as we know it now. These peoplea are nuts if they want virgins and heaven go kill your own radical clown and go to the virgins and let the rest of the world live and prosper. Thank you

Posted by: Bob | May 11, 2007 1:30:44 PM

syria is running the attacks against the USA in iraq.

Posted by: michael | May 11, 2007 4:08:46 PM

No one has more to lose than Iran from a neighbor on its border with a destabilized economy as a result of civil unrest.
So why would Iran contribute to what would eventually turn into its biggest headache through an influx of refugees, militant bleed over and the need and expense to beef up security on it's own borders from Iraqi warlords and insurgents?
It defies any political logic.
I think this report is more about generating justification to rattle swords over our possibly sighting Iran as our next attempted conquest in the middle east.

Posted by: Zach | May 11, 2007 5:20:58 PM

Sure Rubaie, it's everyone's fault except Bush and his puppets like yourself. LOL.

Posted by: Leftandproud | May 11, 2007 7:18:30 PM

Ho hum... And all the while the US harbours a terrorist responsible for an airline bombing...
Pot calling the kettle black.
And how is is that Americans feel well capable of making blanket statements about the middle east, when most have probably never meet a middle eastern person and couldnt find the area on a map unless they were lucky enough to be deployed there.

Posted by: runningdog | May 11, 2007 10:19:43 PM

too many Mike Moore theories floating around here

Posted by: rightandproud | May 11, 2007 11:55:27 PM

Where is the CIA when you need them. Sounds like they could have a "nice" time in Syria.

Posted by: Trouble | May 12, 2007 1:23:54 AM

To leftandproud..."Mowaffak al Rubaie, the national security advisor to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, told ABC News"... I think this man can find Iraq and the middle east on a map. I wonder if you can. I have been in Iraq working with Iraqi's for the past 3 1/2 years. Those of you who think that these terrorists aren't real or some invention of the Right need to wake up and smell the coffee.

Posted by: doug | May 12, 2007 2:46:23 AM

key word is Had, not Has... you can all delude yourselves in to thinking that the entire debate was about WMD's but it is selective memory at best. This is a protracted war of attrition aimed at stateless terrorists propped up by a variety of governments in the middle east, all of which are feeling the heat now that we are here in Iraq. Iraq is the strategic heart of the region with more resources (not just oil), than any country here. Do any of you honestly believe that Libya simply, amazingly saw the light after years?

Posted by: doug | May 12, 2007 8:39:34 AM

Tom Vaitys- the faster we get off the oil, the quicker we make our own fuels and energy- the quicker these people and their bloodlust will become irrelevant to us. Make no mistake we are there because our economy is run on and addicted to oil- change that dynamic and other better things follow. There at least seems to be bipartisan agreement with that

Posted by: Tom Vaitys | May 12, 2007 11:41:31 AM

The neo-conservatives sure can come up with some far-out conspiracy theories. I can't wait for the next one, which will probably allege that Iran is supply Syria with Kryptonite.

Posted by: Eric | May 12, 2007 7:42:11 PM

this is to john: hey it doesnt matter if they had or has wmd's. Your like everyone else who thinks we shouldnt be in iraq, you all FORGOT about 9/11, that is the real reason why we are in there because they helped the taliban bomb the trade centers, i just cant believe how this country has turned into a country full of people who cry about everything and alwasy want to be P.C, we have to stop being friends with everyone, if we listin to all the cry babys in this country we will not be a country for long.


Derick

Posted by: derick | May 14, 2007 3:18:43 PM

Some basic stats at play here:

If we have 200 suicide attacks in Iraq and Gen. Petraeus says that 80-90% are by the foreigners, then that gives us an estimated number of 160-180 foreign fighters. While we can guess that some of the foreigners go on to do other things rather than just blow themselves up, it's likely a good bet that the number of these suckers who do more than that is not great. So we are talking hundreds of these creeps against the estimated tens of thousands of the other insurgent creeps who are, of course, home grown Iraqis.

So what that means is that the talking points about the 'foreign fighters' covers a ***tiny fraction*** of the overall insurgency and a small portion of the ridiculously high number of casualties in Iraq (somewhere between tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands killed or wounded). Additionally, since we know that IEDs and the (allegedly) Iranian made EFPs are causing the majority of our troop casualties, this seems like a classic case of disinformation where they put out the names and countries that they want to focus on, not the complete or accurate story.

Posted by: dadefreese | May 16, 2007 3:30:23 PM

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