BAGHDAD, Iraq – A parliamentary report in Iraq investigating the fall of the city of Mosul to the Islamic State group (ISIS) more than a year ago placed former prime minister Nouri al-Malki’s name at the top of the list, a Kurdish MP said.
Other top officials blamed for the fall of Iraq’s second-largest city include Babakir Zebari, chief of staff of the Iraiq army, Abud Qanbar, commander of the joint operations in Iraq, Ali Ghedan, commander of the combat forces, and Saadun Dlaimi, former defense minister.
The report also implicated former Mosul governor Atheel Nujaifi, said Shakawan Abdulla, deputy head of the investigative committee and a Kurdish MP in the Iraqi parliament.
“A top official accused for the fall of Mosul is the former Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, whose name appears at the top of the list,” Abdulla told Rudaw.
He said MPs from Maliki’s State of law bloc “did not vote in favor of submitting the final report and they tried to remove Maliki from the list but failed to do so,” he told Rudaw.
The committee was composed of 26 members, 17 of whom voted in favor of the report, which included the names of 35 Iraqi army leaders and top officials in Iraq involved.
The report is in two parts, first naming those directly responsible for losing Mosul, and the second blaming those who were negligent when ISIS attacked Mosul, including Nujaifi.
The report has also accused the Turkish consulate in Mosul.
The Iraqi parliament formed a committee of 26 MPs last December to find and punish officials who abandoned Mosul to ISIS.
The extremists captured Mosul after the Iraqi Army fled without a fight, leaving large caches of modern and heavy weapons behind.
