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Maleki rejects allegations over Mosul’s fall

The former premier is facing other pressures, too.

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“No one is above the law and accountability to the people”, parliamentary speaker Saleem al-Jabouri said in a statement, according to The Washington Post.

“An investigation and follow up and accounting of all those who caused the fall of Mosul will be carried out”, Al Jubouri said.

The fall of Ramadi earlier this year and the subsequent bid to reclaim it has stretched resources and pushed Mosul to the bottom of the agenda for the Iraqi army and its US allies.

Some Iraqi politicians have accused Abadi of using the reforms to sideline his political rival.

When Islamic State fighters launched an assault on Mosul in June 2014, Iraq’s army rapidly collapsed, and the militant group swiftly took control of more than a quarter of the country’s territory, pressuring the capital, Baghdad.

Investigative committee member MP Abdulrahim Al Shammari said that Mr Al Maliki, who was prime minister from 2006 until last year, was among those named, as did another member who declined to be identified.

Among the dramatic actions called for in the new anti-corruption measures are an end to the informal sectarian and party-based system for selecting government ministers, and the abolition of the country’s three vice-presidential posts.

This past May the extremist group captured the nearby city of Ramadi, the provincial capital of the Anbar province, where U.S. troops fought some of their deadliest battles of the eight-year Iraq intervention.

Abadi rolled out a reform program a week ago in response to popular pressure from weeks of protests against corruption and poor services, and to a call for drastic change from Iraq’s top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

And a senior British military officer, Brigadier Christopher Ghika, said the city “was lost because the Iraqi commander in Ramadi elected to withdraw”.

“It’s understood I was targeted because I’m going after corrupt people”, he told Reuters.

The decision, announced by his office, will eliminate four ministries, including those of human rights and women’s affairs, and consolidate others.

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In addition, the ministry of science and technology will combine with the ministry of higher education and scientific research.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi