Iraqi Shia militias take charge

Iraq’s Shia paramilitaries said on Tuesday that they had taken charge of the campaign to drive Islamic State from the western province of Anbar, with an openly sectarian codename “Labaik ya Hussein” that could infuriate its Sunni population.

The Iraqi government is scrambling to reverse its biggest military setback in nearly a year, the fall of Ramadi, capital of Anbar province.

Near Ramadi

The Shia militiamen, supported by a smaller cadre of government troops, advanced on Tuesday to within a few kms of a university on Ramadi’s southwestern edge on Tuesday, police sources and Sunni tribal fighters allied to the government said.

In Iraq, the regular military’s failure to hold Ramadi has forced the government to send Iran-backed Shia paramilitaries to help retake the city. Washington is worried as this could enrage residents in the overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim province and push them into the arms of Islamic State.

Syria’s antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim told Reuters by telephone that it appeared as of Tuesday that the ruins in Palmyra had not been damaged.