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Iraq’s most fearsome Shia militia leader speaks out

None of the Shia militias operating in Iraq is regarded with more suspicion by the United States, and more fear by its enemies, than Asaib Ahl al-Haq, the League of the Righteous. Over the last year or so, The Daily Beast has written frequently about this splinter group that was responsible for thousands of attacks […]

Niqash reports:

None of the Shia militias operating in Iraq is regarded with more suspicion by the United States, and more fear by its enemies, than Asaib Ahl al-Haq, the League of the Righteous. Over the last year or so, The Daily Beast has written frequently about this splinter group that was responsible for thousands of attacks on U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq after it started operations under the command of Qais al-Khazali in 2004.

Following the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq in 2011, the League continued to assert itself in Iraq’s politics and on the street. Last year it was believed responsible for the slaughter of 29 women and two men in an attack on an alleged house of prostitution. But since the virtual collapse of Iraq’s U.S.-trained regular army in the face of offensives by the so-called Islamic State, Baghdad has put increasing reliance on Shia militias with close ties to Iran and the head of its external covert action and proxy force operations, Qasem Suleimani.