Iran has congratulated Iraq on its declared victory over the Islamic State jehadi group in Mosul and offered its help to rebuild the devastated country. “Congratulations to brave people and Government of Iraq upon liberation of Mosul,” Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif wrote late Sunday in a tweet.
“When Iraqis join hands, no limits to what they can achieve.”
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi was in Mosul yesterday, officially marking the end of a difficult campaign to retake the city, where ISIS declared its self-styled caliphate three years ago.
Other Iranian officials were also quick to welcome the victory, Iraq’s biggest yet against the jihadists. It was a “great achievement in the path to ending the presence and savage actions of the criminal Daesh (IS) group against the Iraqi nation”, said Ali Shamkhani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, in messages to Abadi and Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the country’s most revered cleric.