Report: Saudi Arabia Finds New Ways to Intervene in Iraq

AhlulBayt News Agency - Referring to the phone conversation between the Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz and the Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, the Saudi Arabian newspaper Al-Watan wrote in mid-April that the Saudi king emphasized to the Iraqi PM on the kingdom’s all-out support for Baghdad, inviting al-Abadi to visit Riyadh with aim at discussing the ways to boost bilateral relations.

King Salman and Haider al-Abadi discussed an array of issues including improvement of Iraq-Saudi ties, battle against the terrorist group ISIS and the security as well as political conditions of Iraq, the Al Watan’s report suggested.

The king of Saudi Arabia during the phone call has declared readiness of the kingdom to back Iraq and shore up cooperation between the two countries.

“Fighting terrorism needs further Iraq’s cooperation with our Arab brothers and the invitation of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to visit Saudi Arabia has come in a suitable time so that both sides could see about an outlook of mutual collaboration in terms of common interests and specifically anti-terror fight,” said Saad al-Hadithi, the spokesman for the Iraqi PM.

Despite the fact that officials of government of former Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki have repeatedly lashed out at Saudi Arabia for its “negative role” in the Iraqi domestic developments and also for its “wide-ranging support for takfiri and terrorist groups in Iraq", PM al-Abadi has given a shift to the Iraqi government’s view on Saudi Arabia.

Actually, al-Abadi’s pathways and thinking have worked as a catalyzer to speed up “open doors policy” with the neighbors adopted by Iraq’s government. Looking deep into the Iraqi PM’s standings, measures and performance and his personal, academic, cultural and his approach differences in general with his predecessors, we can conclude that al-Abadi’s stances and attitudes are way different from those of such earlier PMs as Nouri al-Maliki, Ibrahim al-Jaafari and even Ayad Allawi. One of al-Abadi’s blatant and significant features is change in the foreign policy and making efforts to improve relations with the neighboring Arab states like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. The same efforts were also made by the earlier Iraqi governments, however, they failed to bear any results and thus showed no positive signals for amendment of Baghdad’s foreign policies. But now the policy of “openness to the neighboring countries” of al-Abadi’s government has been largely met with success and approval by the Arab and non-Arab countries like Turkey. At the same time, it has opened a space for speaking out against former PM al-Maliki’s foreign policy.

In regional and international levels the government of al-Abadi has tried to get close to the neighboring Arab countries and reduce challenges as much as possible. Al-Abadi and the members of his government have paid significant visits to regional states including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Jordan and Turkey. The recent Saudi king’s invitation of the Iraqi PM for visiting Riyadh could bear the same significance.

In fact, al-Abadi’s openness policy could be seen as a factor paving the way for further presence and activity of some Arab countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, in Iraq, which so far have proven harmful results rather than positive ones for Iraq.

Therefore, some suggest that due to takfiris’ adoption of Wahhabi ideology and the possibility of their support by the rule of King Salman and also because of the changes ordered by the Saudi king, it is very likely the same Saudi attitude goes on in dealing with Iraq. Some of Iraq’s security authorities are highlighting the same point, believing that open doors policy by PM al-Abadi would not work out a change in Saudi Arabia’s approaches on Iraq, and Riyadh remains moving in the same track and so far new al-Abadi’s stances on the kingdom only helped wrest from Saudi Arabia the excuses for anti-Iraqi measures.

Furthermore, the US double-sided policy towards Iraq in addition to Saudi Arabia’s pressing down the oil prices and giving a multibillion dollars damage to the Iraqi oil-based economy present the necessary evidences that Saudi Arabia’s measures have seriously damaged Iraq’s security conditions and political process. The desperate conditions in Yemen as a result of a devastating aggression by Saudi Arabia encourage the Iraqi pessimism over Riyadh.

On the other side, some believe that King Salman would well receive Iraq’s openness policy and would take steps to amend ties with Baghdad, especially that there already have been criticism over Riyadh’s slow moving to open Saudi embassy in Baghdad. Additionally, the risks of ISIS terror organization for both Iraq and Saudi Arabia and Saudi Arabia’s involvement in the anti-ISIS coalition are given by those who think that Iraqi-Saudi ties move to reconciliation and boosting, though the recent developments of war against Yemen have come to the disappointment of those who think Baghdad and Riyadh ties would see an improvement.

How could the openness and reconciliation policy of al-Abadi help transform the role of such countries as Saudi Arabia from negative to positive?

In response, it could be claimed that none of these Iraqi PM’s measures would spur a change in Saudi Arabian approaches because the Saudis follow the Wahhabist ideology, which essentially opposes a Shiite government in Iraq and moves in line with ISIS in excommunication of the Shiite Muslims, and also would not approve of a strong presence of the Shiites in the Iraqi government. Thereby, at the end of the road the Saudi mission and role do not change in Iraq and any flexibility and well reception of Iraq’s openness policy by Saudi Arabia is passing and ostensible.

The major question is that if we do not doubt substantiality of Iraqi officials’ intentions and objectives towards the neighbors, could the same be adopted on the neighboring Arab countries, especially Saudi Arabia?

As an answer to the question, it seems that al-Abadi’s openness policy has failed to push tangible and considerable changes in Riyadh’s Iraq-related policies, only stirring some preliminary Saudi flexibility especially that the recent Yemeni developments have complicated the conditions. The former Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki could be right to say “Saudi Arabia still keeps fanning tensions in the region and does not want to deal with the current issues using a prudent policy.”




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