Iraq Weapons: SJC Confirms Faction Cooperation

The head of the highest judicial body in Iraq confirmed on Saturday that leaders of armed factions have agreed to cooperate on the issue of restricting weapons to the state.

The head of the Supreme Judicial Council in Iraq, Faiq Zaidan, thanked the leaders of the armed factions for “responding to the advice given to them regarding cooperating together to impose the rule of law and restricting weapons to the state.”

He thanked them for “moving to political action after the national need for military action no longer existed,” according to a statement by the Judicial Council.

But Kataib Hezbollah said that it would not discuss giving up its weapons until after the foreign forces had evacuated from Iraq, stressing – in a statement – that “resistance is a right and its weapons will remain in the hands of its mujahideen.”

Leaders of three other pro-Iranian factions that Washington classifies as “terrorist” confirmed that the time has come to confine weapons to the state, despite their clear lack of commitment to disarming them, which is an old American demand.

The Shiite entities that include armed factions, most notably Asaib Ahl al-Haq, the Iraqi Hezbollah Brigades, the Loyal Ansar Allah Brigades, and the Imam Ali Brigades, ran in the last Iraqi legislative elections and won seats in the new Iraqi parliament, and became, within the formation of the Shiite coordination framework, the most numerous bloc in Parliament.

After the general elections that took place last November, the United States called on the Iraqi government to exclude six factions that it classifies as “terrorist” and work to dismantle them, according to Iraqi officials and diplomats.

Earlier this week, Asaib Ahl al-Haq leader Qais al-Khazali, a key figure in the coordination framework, said, “We believe in the slogan of restricting weapons to the state… given that we are now clearly and stronger part of the state.”

Two other factions, the Loyal Ansar Allah Movement and the Imam Ali Brigades, said on Friday that the time has come to “confine weapons to the state,” while other armed groups have not explicitly announced their position on restricting weapons to the state.