Iraqi Intelligence Diverted 3 Chemical Attacks In Baghdad In 2016 - Interior Ministry

DAMASCUS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 18th September, 2019) Iraqi intelligence prevented three chemical attacks, planned by terrorists to be carried out in Baghdad in 2016, by replacing the intended chemicals in a covert operation, the chief of Iraqi Interior Ministry's intelligence unit, Abu Ali Basri, said on Wednesday.

Last week, Iraqi media reported that Abrar Kubaisi, a 32-year-old female terrorist of the Islamic State organization (IS, banned in Russia), was sentenced to life imprisonment. She was known as one of the key IS leaders in chemical research and development. Before being recruited by terrorists, Kubaisi worked as a chemist in the Iraqi Science Ministry. She admitted plotting chemical attacks since 2010, when she first produced a batch of ricin, a lethal carbohydrate-binding protein, in her home lab.

According to Basri, in mid-2016 the Iraqi intelligence was informed that three batches of chemicals had been brought in Baghdad. The secret service reportedly tracked down where terrorists left the chemicals and figured out the intended attack sites and perpetrators.

"A group of intelligence servicemen intruded to Kubaisi's bedroom and replaced the chemicals by bogus substances of the same color and in similar containers, thus deceiving the terrorists and letting them actually conduct the operation," Basri said, as quoted by Al Sabah newspaper.

He added that all other Kubaisi-trained terrorists were gradually hunted down and it was for that purpose that this information got disclosed only now - in order to catch them all.

The IS terrorist organization has seized massive territories in Iraq in June 2014. Mosul, Iraq's second most populous city, became one of the major strongholds of IS terrorists in the country. Its infrastructure was almost completely destroyed after the Iraqi forces launched a massive liberation operation in October 2016 and managed to completely liberate it by July 2017. Similar operations were carried out in other parts of Iraq, and the government declared full victory over IS in December 2017, even though scattered terrorist attacks still take place occasionally.