The Iraqi Foreign Ministry summoned the British Chargé d’Affaires Ruth Coverall on Sunday and handed her a memorandum of protest over statements made by London’s ambassador to Baghdad, Stephen Hickey, who is currently outside the country.
The ministry said in a statement that it had summoned Chargé d’Affaires Ruth Coverall “due to the ambassador’s presence outside Iraq and to hand her a memorandum of protest.”
The statement added that the protest came “as a result of the statements made by Hitchens, which touched on security and political issues in a way that reflects a dark picture of Iraq, its government and components.”
During the summons, Baghdad stressed the need to open up to the Iraqi experience from the perspective of common interests, and to avoid anything that contradicts the serious vision that the Iraqi government and its constitutional institutions are working on, according to the same statement.
Last Thursday, the British ambassador said during his participation in a talk show broadcast by the Rudaw Media Network (an independent network based in Erbil) and circulated on social media platforms, that “militias outside the state may involve Iraq in international problems or even drag it into war,” adding that it is “a point of weakness that causes fragility in the state.”
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2024-08-20 18:09:29