U.S.-led Forces Target Islamic State With 12 Air Strikes in Iraq, Syria
U.S.-led forces have launched nine air strikes in Iraq and three in Syria against Islamic State militants since Wednesday, the American military said on Thursday. The Combined Joint Task Force...
By: Nirvana News
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U.S.-led Forces Target Islamic State With 12 Air Strikes in Iraq, Syria - Video
Iraq's foreign minister is coming to New Zealand and he'll tell the government how it can best help the fight against Islamic State extremists.
Ministers on Tuesday confirmed troops were training for a possible deployment to Iraq, but said no decision had been taken to send them.
Ibrahim al-Ja'afari's visit on Friday is likely to settle the issue, if he asks for help with training Iraqi forces.
That's the government's preferred option, and it has ruled out sending troops in a combat role.
Foreign Minister Murray McCully announced the visit on Wednesday.
"New Zealand is currently considering options for a non-combat, training role, in Iraq and this visit is an opportunity to gain the Iraqi government's perspective on how New Zealand can best assist," he said.
"Any capacity building role for the New Zealand military in Iraq will be dependent on an invitation from the Iraqi government."
Dr al-Ja'afari will meet Prime Minister John Key, Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee and Mr McCully during his one-day visit to Auckland.
Opposition parties say the government has already decided to send troops, and that they have been training since late last year for a deployment in late February or March.
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Iraq's foreign minister to visit NZ
Labour wants New Zealand to spend money on aid for Iraqi refugees, not soldiers to fight in their country.
The government's given the Defence Force the go-ahead for contingency training to begin ahead of a possible deployment to Iraq.
Labour's defence spokesman Phil Goff told Newstalk ZB's Mike Hosking he believes the money used on the Defence Force training could be better spent.
"I think if you really want to achieve something in tangible terms, putting the same sort of money into helping the region and the camps in the region as we're putting sending trainers to Iraq would achieve a whole lot more."
Goff is continuing to query why New Zealand personnel would be sent to the Middle East.
"The real question you've got to ask whenever you put people in harms way is whether there is an achievable objective, now I seriously doubt that there is an achievable objective for New Zealand in Iraq."
Cultural awareness is among contingency training New Zealand troops have begun in preparation for deployment to Iraq, in the fight against Islamic State.
Professor Robert Ayson of Victoria University's Centre for Strategic Studies says while all the soldiers won't be required to learn the language, cultural orientation is important.
"In most cultures there are things that you can do unintentionally to offend people and so it's important for them to know what might offend the people they're working with, what might generate better partnerships."
Islamic State may be growing more sophisticated, but a former chief of the New Zealand Defence Force says it will never match any enemies we have faced in the past.
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Iraq training resources better spent elsewhere?
JOHN KIRK-ANDERSON
NZ troops in Basra, Southern Iraq, in 2004.
Deploying New Zealand troops to Iraq was decided long ago, and pretending no decision has been made "just isn't honest", Labour says.
Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee yesterday confirmed the defence force had been told it could undertake "special contingency training" for a deployment that could be announced as early as the end of the month.
The contingency training did not mean a deployment to Iraq was imminent, and did not pre-empt a Cabinet decision, Brownlee said.
But Labour defence spokesman Phil Goff said troops had been training for some time.
READ MORE: * NZ troops training for Iraq * US aid worker Kayla Mueller confirmed killed
Brownlee was questioned on troops training in December, after NZ First defence spokesman Ron Mark had reportedly been told by army sources a group earmarked for deployment had been told to prepare to leave between the end of February and the start of March.
A Defence Force spokesman said in December no instruction had been received from the Government to prepare to go to Iraq, but the Defence Force had "made its own determination to prepare troops for a possible deployment to the Middle East".
Goff said Brownlee's claim that the contingency training did not pre-empt any Cabinet decision was not credible.
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NZ Iraq deployment a fait accompli, says Labour
British militant colloquially dubbed "Jihadi John," who has appeared in a number of ISIS execution and threat videos, as seen in one released Jan. 20, 2015 CBS News
Last Updated Feb 10, 2015 9:55 PM EST
WASHINGTON -- Foreign fighters are streaming into Syria and Iraq in unprecedented numbers to join the Islamic State or Iraq and Syria (ISIS) or other extremist groups, including at least 3,400 from Western nations among 20,000 from around the world, U.S. intelligence officials say in an updated estimate of a top terrorism concern.
Intelligence agencies now believe that as many as 150 Americans have tried and some have succeeded in reaching in the Syrian war zone, officials told the House Homeland Security Committee in testimony prepared for delivery on Wednesday. Some of those Americans were arrested en route, some died in the area and a small number are still fighting with extremists.
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The fight against ISIS is stretching to Afghanistan. An American drone strike Monday killed Abdul Rauf Khadim, a former Taliban commander and Gua...
The testimony and other data were obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press. A U.S. intelligence official confirmed the information to CBS News.
Nick Rasmussen, chief of the National Counterterrorism Center, said the rate of foreign fighter travel to Syria is without precedent, far exceeding the rate of foreigners who went to wage jihad in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen or Somalia at any other point in the past 20 years.
U.S. officials fear that some of the foreign fighters, who come from 90 countries, will return undetected to their homes in Europe or the U.S. to mount terrorist attacks. At least one of the men responsible for the attack on a satirical magazine in Paris had spent time with Islamic extremists in Yemen.
Meanwhile, the White House circulated a proposal Tuesday that would have Congress authorize the U.S. military to fight ISIS terrorists over the next three years. A formal request for legislation is expected on Wednesday.
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20,000 foreign fighters flock to Syria, Iraq to join terrorists