MOSCOW, September 12 (RIA Novosti) - NATO has failed to admit the fact that the crisis in Iraq, large parts of which are now controlled by the Islamic State (IS) jihadists, is the consequence of the US-led military action the Western powers took against the Middle East nation in 2003, Russia's envoy to NATO Alexander Grushko said Friday.
"We know the genesis of ISIL [IS]: today's situation is in many ways the result of the bombings of Iraq, but NATO can't admit it," the official said.
Grushko also argued that NATO believes that the Islamic extremists' rapid advance in Iraq and Syria was triggered by the Syrian government's actions. The official branded such claims as "shifting the blame."
The Islamic State is a Sunni fundamentalist group, which began fighting Syrian government forces in 2012 and launched an offensive on Iraq in 2014. The group seized vast territories across Iraq and Syria and proclaimed an Islamic caliphate in late June. Since August, the United States has been carrying out airstrikes against the IS fighters in Iraq. Wednesday, US President Barack Obama said he is not ruling out the possibility of approving anti-IS airstrikes in Syria – a move, opposed by Damascus and Moscow.
