Haines beheading "heinous and cowardly". Paris summit to counter Islamic State
Paris (AsiaNews / Agencies) - The UN Security Council yesterday condemned the "heinous and cowardly" beheading of David Haines, a British security officer with an NGO. The news of the execution itself posted online by the Islamic State (IS).
Haines, 44, from East Yorkshire, lived
in Croatia with
his second wife, a Croatian, and their four year old daughter. He was kidnapped by ISIS in Syria in 2013.
The third beheading - after that of James
Foley and Steven
Sotloff - has
sparked condemnation from many governments and redoubled their determination
to fight the IS. British
Prime Minister David Cameron,
who has accused Islamist militants of not being "Muslim, but monsters", promised that his country will do "whatever
is necessary" to destroy the
IS (formerly Isis).
Even French President François Hollande said that the Haines
beheading pushes the world to take action against the IS. In fact this morning foreign ministers from several countries
are due to meet in Paris to plan a
common strategy against Islamist terrorism.
The meeting was called by Hollande
and his Iraqi counterpart
Fouad Massoum. Participants
include the five permanent members of the Security Council, along with European and Arab
countries that have decided to support Barack Obama's strategy to reduce
and destroy the IS.
The new Caliphate occupies parts of Syria and Iraq, and according to the CIA and has a force of about 30 thousand
fighters.
Thus far France, together
with the USA, are alone in carrying out
targeted air strikes on miltant's positions.
Western countries have ruled out sending ground troops, even if there are hundreds of experts and military advisers in
Iraq. Some analysts, such as Marwan al-Muasher, the former Jordanian foreign minister, believe that neither will Arab nations offer troops,
but intelligence tools.
In addition to the military campaign,
the Paris Conference should also discuss the
support required by the new Iraqi government, more open to different components of society, even Sunni;
ways to block the flow of funds and new recruits
to the IS; the
reconstruction of cities and villages
destroyed in the fighting.
Syria and Iran were not invited, the most threatened by the former ISIS and who border Iraq, were not invited to attend the conference.
What is probable is that faced with a growing coalition of
opposition to them, the Islamist militia will step up their threats.
The Haines execution, entitled "A Message to America's allies", was preceded by a condemnation of the Cameron's foreign policy by the victim, and a speech by the Executioner who has promised to drag the British people into another "bloody and unwinnable war" for having "voluntarily entered into a coalition with the United States against the Islamic State". In the video, the group threatened to kill a British hostage, Alan Henning. Henning, 47, from Salford, is married with two children, he is a taxi driver and a volunteer in driver of aid convoys to Syria.
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