Allawi: Iraq lost its sovereignty to Iran

Former Iraqi interim prime minister and head of Iraqya political bloc Iyad Allawi on Friday accused the government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki of failing to protect the Iraqi sovereignty, which he said is lost to Iran and its proxy militias.

“Unfortunately Iraq’s sovereignty is completely violated and the situation in Iraq now is sad, even on the regional level,” Allawi said during an interview with Al Arabiya News Channel from London.

“There are many proofs to this and one of them is Iraq’s inability to stop militias from going to Syria or prevent Iranian planes from using Iraqi airspace to transport weapons to the ruling regime in Syria,” he added.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari had said that Iraq is unable to stop its neighbor Iran transferring weapons to Syria through its airspace.

“We reject and condemn the transfer of weapons through our airspace and we will inform the Iranian side of that formally. But we do not have the ability to stop it,” he told pan-Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat in July.

Allawi said he understands the lack of military ability to stop Iran from violating Iraq’s sovereignty but that Prime Minister Maliki does not have the will to use diplomacy and international organizations.

“Iraq could resort to the United Nations, the Arab League, or the Organization of Islamic Conference to force Iran to refrain from violating Iraq’s airspace,” Allawi said.

His political block earned more seats than Maliki’s State of Law coalition in the 2010 parliamentary elections, but he failed to be elected as prime minister.

Maliki formed a government coalition and became prime minister. Ever since, Maliki has been accused, even by his U.S. allies, of following a sectarian political agenda that favors Iran against other regional powers, like Saudi Arabia.

He was also accused of mounting a crackdown campaign against the Iraqi Sunni leaders, arresting several of them. The perceived marginalization of Sunnis under Maliki gave rise to al-Qaeda militancy in the country.