Region

WASHINGTON — US federal prosecutors have charged an Iranian-American with trying to ship sensitive documents on the F-35 fighter jet to Iran, according to court documents.

Mozaffar Khazaee, who was arrested last week, is accused of trying to smuggle thousands of pages of F-35 blueprints and technical documents, authorities said in a US government affidavit.

Agents inspected a shipment to the Iranian city of Hamadan that the 59-year-old suspect claimed contained household goods.

Instead, they found “boxes of documents consisting of sensitive technical manuals, specification sheets, and other proprietary material relating to the United States Air Force’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter programme and military jet engines”.

Khazaee was arrested on January 9 at Newark International Airport in New Jersey before he was able to board a connecting flight to Frankfurt, Germany, en route to Iran, the US attorney’s office for the district of Connecticut said.

Khazaee, who became a US citizen in 1991, was charged with “transporting, transmitting and transferring in interstate or foreign commerce goods obtained by theft, conversion, or fraud,” which carries a potential 10-year prison sentence.

The documents he tried to send included design outlines of the fighter’s jet engine that were labelled as subject to export restrictions, officials said.

The radar-evading F-35 warplane is the most expensive US weapons programme ever and is supposed to form the backbone of the future American fighter fleet.

DAMASCUS — A Palestinian minister on Tuesday accused “terrorists” fighting to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad of blocking aid access to the Yarmouk refugee camp in southern Damascus.

Rebels control swathes of Yarmouk, but for months government forces have imposed a suffocating siege on the camp, where some 20,000 Palestinians live despite terrible shortages.

Palestinian Labour Minister Ahmad Majdalani, who was visiting Damascus to negotiate aid access to the camp, said its Palestinian residents must not be used as “hostages” in the conflict.

An aid convoy heading to Yarmouk was targeted on Monday “some 100 metres away from the agreed meeting point”, on the edges of the camp, Majdalani said at a press conference in Damascus.

He said “the source of fire was known... to be controlled by Al Nusra Front, Ahrar Al Sham and Suqur Al Golan,” directly accusing rebel groups battling Assad’s troops.

Majdalani added “all these groups are known for their terrorist links and methodology”.

The minister also said Palestinians “everywhere know... that those who have taken the camp hostage are these groups, not the Syrian authorities”.

Some 45 people have died in recent months because of food and medical shortages in Yarmouk, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group has said, with the most recent death on Tuesday.

Monday’s aid convoy was the sixth to have failed to enter the camp.

Palestinian sources have told AFP the convoys were blocked from entering by gunfire, but did not specify who was responsible.

But the opposition Yarmouk local coordination committee said Assad loyalists had blocked the convoy.

“The Syrian regime and the [pro-Damascus] Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command... kickstarted a clash targeting the Palestinians and everyone else there, to continue with their brazen policy of starvation,” the activist group said via Facebook.

The convoy of six trucks carried 1,700 30-kilogramme food parcels, each of which could feed a family for 20 days.

In a reflection of the desperation in the camp, footage distributed by activists on Tuesday showed a young man from Yarmouk crying for assistance.

“We don’t have the money to pay for a kilo of rice, we don’t have money to pay for a kilo of bulgur... We don’t have anything to do with this conflict. We just want to eat and drink, we want to be safe,” he wept.

BEIRUT — A Lebanese group loyal to Al Qaeda vowed Tuesday to keep up its attacks against Iran, Hizbollah and Israel, less than a fortnight after the death of its leader, Majid Al Majid.

The Saudi-born Majid, whose group claimed responsibility for a November attack on the Iranian embassy in Beirut, died in the custody of Lebanese authorities, who said he was ill before his arrest.

“His project will continue, God willing, in striking Iran, its party [Lebanese Shiite group Hizbollah] and the aggressor Jews [Israel], and in defending oppressed Sunnis everywhere,” the Abdallah Azzam Brigades said in an online statement.

The group also lashed out against Lebanon for “arbitrarily detaining” Islamists, and said Lebanese miliary intelligence was under the control of “Iran’s party”, another reference to Hizbollah, which is closely allied with Shiite Iran.

It criticised “attacks against Sunnis orchestrated by Iran’s party, which controls Lebanon’s military intelligence and manipulates it at will”.

It said Iran “manipulates all Lebanese state institutions to protect both its interests and those of its Baathist ally in Syria”, a reference to President Bashar Assad’s regime.

According to a judicial source, Majid died from poor health on January 4, days after he was arrested.

His body was later sent back to his native Saudi Arabia, after the Saudi embassy had expressed relief over his arrest.

The brigades’ statement said Majid was detained while he was “unconscious” and in intensive care.

“The medical devices that were allowing [Majid] to breathe were pulled out, and God had mercy on him and received him as a martyr,” it charged.

The statement was issued to express condolences over the death of Majid, whom it termed the “prince of the Levant, who has gone to meet his God”, and whose passing “has filled [our] hearts with sadness”.

The November attack on the Iranian embassy in Hizbollah’s south Beirut stronghold killed 25 people.

Majid had “directly supervised the preparation of” the twin suicide bombing, the statement said.

The attack came as tensions rose in Lebanon over the role of Hizbollah in the conflict in neighbouring Syria.

Hizbollah publicly confirmed last April that its fighters were supporting Assad’s regime against the Sunni-dominated rebels, who are backed by most Lebanese Sunnis.

BAGHDAD — Iraq is struggling to tighten control of its border with Syria, alarmed by a resurgent Al Qaeda force that seeks to build an Islamic state across a frontier drawn in colonial times.

The Baghdad government has deployed troops and new US- and Russian-made weaponry to try and cut the militants’ cross-border supply lines, hoping that can kill off the threat. But as US forces found before them, it is a near-impossible task.

The Syrian civil war that has inflamed sectarian tensions across the region, and a desolate geography favouring smugglers and guerrillas are just two of Baghdad’s difficulties in getting a firm grip on the 600-km desert boundary.

Another is tribal ties that span the border, with Iraqis regularly sending food, supplies and weapons to Syrian relatives enduring that country’s war. Iraq says Sunni Islamists have gone back and forth from Syria during the conflict.

Some local people, like desert tribesmen elsewhere, are reluctant even to recognise international borders.

Crucially, political and sectarian animosities felt by the Sunni population of the western province of Anbar towards the Shiite-led central government weaken its authority there.

“It’s not winnable, to control this part of Iraq’s borders,” said Mustafa Alani, an Iraqi analyst at the Gulf Research Centre think tank, referring to Anbar and its neighbour to the north, Nineveh.

“Even the Americans couldn’t do it,” he said, referring to the US occupation of Iraq from 2003 to 2011.

Al Qaeda-linked militants, feeding off widespread Sunni resentment at perceived mistreatment by Prime Minister Nouri Maliki’s government, swept into the Anbar cities of Fallujah and Ramadi on January 1. Ramadi is now back under government control.

Maliki is trying to enlist tribal support to stamp out Al Qaeda’s latest incarnation in Iraq and Syria, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), whose rise has helped drive violence back to the worst level in at least five years.

His task is unusually complicated, for ISIL, which announced its formation in 2013 out of pre-existing groups, operates on both sides of the border, fighting the governments of both Maliki and Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Maliki said Iraqi border forces had reduced the passage of Al Qaeda fighters, weapons and smugglers. “But we have not been able so far to close all the crossing points they can infiltrate due to the difficult environmental and geographic conditions,” he told Reuters in an interview this week.

“There are also border cities which are half-Iraqi, half Syrian and their tribes have family connections, they are cousins.”

The size of Anbar — comprising a third of Iraq’s territory and bordering Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan — means that tenuous control of its borders is an important vulnerability.

“ISIL’s expansion in Syria ... has offered a tremendous platform to recruit, train and fundraise in ways that positioned the group to both stoke and exploit sectarian tensions in Iraq,” Brian Fishman wrote for the Combating Terrorism Centre, a research unit at the US Military Academy at West Point.

The Syrian-Iraqi border was drawn in the 1920s, when colonial powers France and Britain carved the two countries out of the remnants of the Ottoman empire after World War I.

Almost a century on, much of it remains just a line on a map.

There are two major border crossings between Iraq and Syria, one in Anbar and one in Nineveh, northwest of the city of Mosul. They are manned by Iraqi forces and fortified with blast walls, barbed wire and watchtowers.

But many minor Iraqi posts in between consist only of small, single-storey buildings with a watchtower and staffed by half a dozen security personnel.

These posts can be as much as 10km apart and their defenders have only light weapons and a single military vehicle, security officials said. Border guards there lack the equipment needed to monitor the frontier properly, they said.

Desert and shrub

The border in Anbar, usually patrolled by just a few thousand guards, is mostly open expanses of desert and scrub that allow ISIL fighters easy access to rear bases in Syria.

Hillsides, hidden caves and tracks have made the region a haven for smugglers for generations — and more recently for militants.

After the US invasion in 2003, the border became a source of tension as an anti-American, Sunni insurgency mounted.

Iraq and the United States often accused Syria of allowing insurgents to cross the border, a charge denied by Damascus.

No one doubts that Sunni fighters flow both ways today. Some Iraqi Shiites are also in Syria fighting for Assad’s forces.

Maliki said his government had banned the involvement of Iraqis in Syria. “We absolutely refuse to be involved in the crisis in any way,” he said. “No weapons, no supplies and no fighters.”

The border area features large cave systems and valleys, several of which extend for dozens of miles across the border and are used by ISIL to set up training camps, living quarters and arms depots, Iraqi security sources say.

Alarmed by the contagion spreading from Syria’s war, the government launched Operation Iron Hammer on December 23 to try to break the link between ISIL in Iraq and Syria.

“We want to separate the two frontiers, as each is feeding off the other,” said a senior security official in Baghdad.

Iraqi forces used Russian Mi-35 attack helicopters for the first time, as well as warplanes and US Hellfire missiles supplied after Maliki visited Washington in November.

“When we cut off its funds and support by blocking the route from Iraq to Syria, Al Qaeda will be finished in Syria, as it will be in Iraq,” the security official said.

Iraqi military officers say the new weaponry, as well as satellite imagery and other US-supplied intelligence, has given them new capabilities to hit a previously elusive enemy.

“There was some hesitation among the Americans with regard to providing us with light and heavy weapons,” Maliki said.

“But after the wisdom shown by Iraq in dealing with the recent crisis ... everyone rushed, Congress and the US administration, and asked us to provide a list of weapons we need to fight the terrorist gangs and Al Qaeda organisations.”

But the extent to which Iraq’s military campaign in Anbar border regions has damaged ISIL remains uncertain.

JUBA — A boat carrying civilians desperately fleeing heavy violence in South Sudan sank while crossing the Nile River, killing some 200 people, a military official said Tuesday, as fighting between rebels and government forces moved closer to the capital.

Warfare in the world’s newest state has displaced more than 400,000 people since mid-December, with the front lines constantly shifting as loyalist troops and renegade forces gain and lose territory in battles often waged along ethnic lines.

Lt. Col. Philip Aguer, the South Sudanese military spokesman, said there was fighting about 70 kilometres north of the South Sudanese capital of Juba. Heavy fighting also erupted Tuesday in Malakal, the capital of oil-producing Upper Nile state, which renegade forces briefly held before government troops retook it, he said.

As control of certain regions has changed, tens of thousands of residents have fled their homes to escape fighting that often pits the Dinka ethnic group of President Salva Kiir against the Nuer group of Riek Machar, the former vice president who now commands renegade forces. A boat on the Nile — fleeing the violence in Upper Nile State and carrying mostly women and children— sank on Saturday, killing at least 200 people, according to Aguer.

The violence has displaced 413,000 people, including more than 73,000 who sought refuge in neighbouring countries, according to the United Nations. Some of the fiercest battles have been fought in Jonglei, South Sudan’s largest state, where for months government troops had been trying to put down a local rebellion. South Sudan’s government now says it has made peace with the leader of that rebellion, David Yau Yau, a renegade colonel from the Murle tribe who appears to have cut a deal with the Dinka-led government against Machar’s mostly Nuer forces.

South Sudan has a history of ethnic rivalry, and its many tribes have long battled each other in recurring cycles of violence.

Nearly 10,000 people have been killed in the latest fighting, according to one estimate by an International Crisis Group analyst.

The Associated Press has seen video showing a representative of Kiir’s government meeting with Yau Yau in Jonglei’s Pibor county earlier this week after the militia leader agreed to integrate his fighters into the national army. In the video bodies of men in combat fatigues litter the bushes, but it is impossible to tell if the dead are rebels or government troops.

Troops from neighbouring Uganda appear to be actively fighting on behalf of Kiir, who is reportedly seeking the long-term commitment of Ugandan troops in the fight against renegade forces.

In Ethiopia, where peace talks are taking place, a spokesman for the rebels, former South Sudan Brig. Gen. Lul Ruai Kong, said Ugandan helicopters and fighter jets are bombing rebel positions.

Another pro-rebel official, Gideon Gatpan Thaor, said fighters described being hit with a smoky weapon that burns, possibly white phosphorous.

A Ugandan military official denied Ugandan forces are already involved in active combat but admitted that is where they are headed following the rebels’ threat to take Juba, where fighting erupted on December 15 before it spread across the oil-producing East African country.

Lt. Col. Paddy Ankunda, the Ugandan military spokesman, said Tuesday that Ugandan and South Sudanese army officials are drafting a “status of forces agreement” that will soon be signed by both countries after Kiir requested the Ugandans extend their deployment.

When that pact is signed, he said, “there could be things under the agreement which the forces might engage in.” He said a Ugandan army colonel previously with the African Union peacekeeping force in Somalia has been appointed as head of Ugandan forces in South Sudan, part of wider efforts by Uganda to formalise a mission that is increasingly controversial at home and abroad.

On a recent trip to Juba, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni warned Machar that East African countries would unite to “defeat” him if he did not start talks with the government.

It now appears Museveni is going it alone, sending to South Sudan thousands of men and hardware that may have given government forces an edge against rebels who threatened Juba. Kiir has refused to release the political detainees who are Machar’s allies, one of the conditions set by the rebels before they can sign any ceasefire deal with the government.

Ugandan officials initially said troops were deployed to South Sudan to protect key installations such as the airport as well as to facilitate civilian evacuations.

Amid rumours some Ugandan forces have been killed or wounded in South Sudan, Ugandan lawmakers on Tuesday met for a special session to discuss the legality of the deployment.

Museveni is highly influential in Juba, where his prestige is based in part on his decades long support for the armed secessionist movement that eventually led to the creation in 2011 of the new state of South Sudan.

PRAGUE — Palestinian diplomats have apologised for hiding illegal weapons at the Prague embassy where a blast killed the ambassador on New Year’s Day, the Czech foreign ministry said on Tuesday.

“A high-ranking Palestinian foreign ministry official... issued an official apology from the Palestinian side for the illegal presence of weapons on the premises of the Palestinian embassy,” the ministry said in a statement.

After the deadly blast, police found 12 firearms at the embassy, including sub-machineguns and sidearms that were not officially registered in the Czech Republic.

They have refused further comment on the weapons pending the results of an official probe.

The DNES newspaper said police found Skorpion VZ61 sub-machineguns and VZ82 sidearms produced in the former Czechoslovakia and supplied to the Palestine Liberation Organisation before communism fell in Czechoslovakia in 1989.

The Palestinians also apologised “for the incident that resulted in the tragic death of Palestinian ambassador Jamal Al Jamal on January 1”, the ministry statement added.

Jamal, 56, died only three months after taking office, following an explosion that occurred soon after he opened a safe.

Czech police have described it as an accident, but have refused further comment pending their investigation.

The late diplomat’s daughter Rana Al Jamal, however, believes her father was murdered.

Czech foreign ministry spokeswoman Johana Grohova refused to identify the official who issued the apology on Monday.

“Both sides have agreed it is necessary to wait for the outcome of the police investigation... The Palestinian side has expressed its resolve to fully accept its conclusions,” the Czech foreign ministry said.

“The Palestinian side stressed it had drawn the relevant conclusions and taken the necessary measures to prevent similar incidents from happening,” it added.

DUBAI — The ruler of Dubai, a Gulf trade and investment hub with strong links to Iran, said in remarks broadcast on Monday that the international community should ease sanctions on the Islamic Republic.

Under a deal struck in November, Iran is expected to curb its nuclear activity in exchange for a limited easing of the international sanctions. The pact will come into force January 20, Iran and world powers agreed on Sunday.

Asked whether he thought it was time to lift the sanctions, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who is also the Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates, told British broadcaster the BBC: “I think so and give Iran a space... Iran is our neighbour and we don’t want any problem, he said, adding that “everybody will benefit”.

Despite a decade of sanctions, Iran has managed to get most of the commodities and goods it needs via Dubai’s flourishing re-export market, although new embargoes imposed by the United States and its allies in late 2011 and early 2012 have hit it hard.

The vast majority of trade between Iran and its Gulf Arab neighbours is routed through Dubai, home to tens of thousands of ethnic Iranians and one of seven emirates making up the United Arab Emirates.

Iran says its atomic energy programme is aimed purely at electricity generation and other civilian purposes, although past Iranian attempts to hide sensitive nuclear activity from UN non-proliferation inspectors raised concerns.

“I think they’re telling the truth when they say just for civilian power”, Sheikh Mohammed said in the interview.

Sisi should stay in army

Shortly after the November 24 deal, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif went to the UAE to try and improve relations with the US ally.

Across the Gulf from Iran, the UAE stands to benefit directly from any easing of sanctions under the nuclear deal that have dampened regional trade.

Zarif met Sheikh Mohammed during his December visit and the UAE was the first Gulf Arab state to cautiously welcome November’s nuclear deal. The UAE foreign minister flew to Iran days after the agreement was signed, on a trip planned before the deal, calling for a partnership with the Islamic Republic.

The six Sunni Muslim-ruled members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) are wary of Iranian power in the Middle East, fearing the Shiite Muslim-led country is seeking regional dominance and stirring sectarian tension. Tehran denies this.

But they have also welcomed Iran’s “new direction” under President Hassan Rouhani and said Tehran should do more to promote stability in the region.

Sheikh Mohammed also said Egypt, which is due to vote on a constitutional referendum this week, was better off without Islamist president Mohamed Morsi who was deposed by the army in July after mass protests against his rule.

The UAE is deeply mistrustful of the Muslim Brotherhood and relations soured when Morsi became Egypt’s first freely elected president after the downfall of autocrat Hosni Mubarak in 2011.

The UAE, along with Sunni powerhouse Saudi Arabia, have championed army chief General Abdel Fattah Al Sisi who deposed Morsi, and have poured billions of dollars to shore up the country’s beleaguered economy since Morsi’s downfall.

There has been widespread speculation about whether Sisi, who is depicted by his supporters as a saviour who will restore stability to the shaken country, would run for presidential elections slated for later this year.

Sheikh Mohammed said Sisi was better off in the army, saying: “I hope he stays in the army. And someone else [stands] for the presidency.”

On Syria, Sheikh Mohammed said the UAE was only comfortable supporting displaced Syrians in Jordan and Turkey, as opposed to providing support to rebel groups, some of whom are extremist in nature. 

CAIRO — A crackdown by Egypt’s authorities on the Muslim Brotherhood has left hundreds of Islamic charities struggling for funds, with experts warning the move could impact this week’s referendum on a new constitution.

The Tuesday-Wednesday vote has been billed as the first step in Egypt’s democratic transition after the military overthrew Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in July following huge protests against his one-year rule.

The government installed by the military after Morsi’s ouster has seized assets, bank accounts, hospitals, schools and institutions run by Islamic charities as part of its crackdown on Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood movement.

Analysts say Morsi’s supporters, who have been clamouring for his reinstatement, are likely to find backing for their call for a boycott of the referendum among grassroots Egyptians who are dependent on the charities.

“These charities will definitely have an impact on the referendum. The turnout will be much less this time,” analyst Osama Diab of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights told AFP.

“The focus of the Muslim Brotherhood is to ensure a low turnout and the Islamic charities can influence people for that. They can mobilise people through these charities to guarantee a low turnout,” said Diab.

Mustafa Kamel Al Sayyed, professor of political science at Cairo University, agreed.

“The Muslim Brotherhood could use charity networks for mobilising people to boycott the referendum or elections, given their influence on the people,” he said.

“These charities do offer services that aid people and the government’s measures [against them]could backfire,” he said.

According to experts, however, the boycott is not likely to be extensive enough to affect the final outcome of the vote.

The charities say they aid millions of impoverished people in Egypt.

They are also seen by many as providing the Brotherhood with a solid social platform that helped it dominate all elections since the fall of president Hosni Mubarak in the 2011 uprising.

Experts say the authorities suspect that some of the funds are used by the Brotherhood to mobilise anti-government protesters or even for funding militant activities.

A tour of a hospital, one among 30 such facilities operated by the Islamic Medical Association, a non-profit charity group, reveals the extensive reach such charities enjoy in Egypt.

“To me it does not matter who operates this hospital,” said Mahmoud Sami, father of a prematurely born baby that was recuperating in an incubator at the hospital in a crowded Cairo district.

“We are getting quality treatment for our child at an affordable price.”

The hospital charges Sami 200 Egyptian pounds ($28, 22 euros) daily, compared to about 500 pounds charged by private hospitals, while public hospitals are ill-equipped.

Officials at the hospital say they treat about 800 patients daily.

But manager Ayman Mustafa says the hospital is struggling because its bank account has been frozen, and could be forced to shut down, affecting thousands of people in need of care.

“Every day we deposit money into our bank account, but we can’t withdraw our funds because the account is frozen,” Mustafa said, adding that the hospital depends on private donations.

Analysts say people like Sami who depend on Islamic charities could be swayed to boycott the vote at the referendum.

“These organisations have created a goodwill, have created empathy” for the Brotherhood, said James Dorsey, Middle East expert at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies.

“It has created a platform that the mother organisation can use, but this does not deny the fact that these organisations provide services that benefit people.”

These networks “legitimately exploit the failures of the state,” he said.

‘Crackdown on everything Islamic’

Gamaa Sharaaya is Egypt largest Islamic charity with a network of 1,100 hospitals, clinics, schools and mosques that it says serve more than nine million people.

The crackdown is “on anything that is even remotely Islamic”, even if it is not linked to the Brotherhood, said Mustafa Ismail, secretary general of the 100-year-old charity.

Ismail said his charity does not sympathise with Morsi’s Brotherhood. “We have no political affiliations. We only serve the poor and the needy.”

But the social solidarity minister, Ahmed El Borei, insists the charities help “control the poor politically” while former ministry adviser, Mohamed Al Dmerdash, says the crackdown on the charities benefits only the Brotherhood.

BAGHDAD — UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged Iraqi leaders to address the “root causes” of a surge in bloodshed as security forces clashed on Monday with gunmen in violence-racked Anbar province.

But Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki, standing next to Ban at a joint news conference, insisted that the Anbar unrest was not due to internal problems, and that dialogue with militants was not an option.

The UN chief’s visit to Baghdad comes just months ahead of general elections, with the country suffering its worst spate of unrest since 2008 and militants holding an entire city and parts of another on Baghdad’s doorstep.

It is the first time fighters have exercised such open control in major cities since the insurgency that followed the 2003 US-led invasion, and Ban’s remarks echoed US calls for Iraqi officials to focus on political reconciliation, in addition to ongoing military operations.

“I would urge the leaders of the country ... to address the root causes of the problems,” Ban said.

“They should ensure that there is nobody left behind. There should be political cohesion” and “social cohesion, and political dialogue, inclusive dialogue,” he said.

“The security situation in Iraq is undoubtedly a source of great concern,” said Ban, adding that he is “deeply concerned by this escalation of violence in Anbar governorate”.

But Maliki insisted that “what is happening in Anbar has no relation to Iraqi problems” and ruled out dialogue with jihadists.

Events in the province have united Iraqis, he said, and therefore “today, there is nothing called dialogue”.

“Dialogue with whom — with Al Qaeda? There is no dialogue with Al Qaeda, and the Iraqi national decision is to end Al Qaeda,” Maliki said, referring to militant group the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which has played a major role in nationwide violence.

Ban is on two-day visit to Iraq and is also due to meet Parliament Speaker Osama Al Nujaifi, lawmakers, Vice President Khudayr Al Khuzaie and the head of Iraq’s election commission.

Iraq is embroiled in a bloody standoff with militants and anti-government tribes in Anbar, the mostly-Sunni desert province in west Iraq which shares a long border with conflict-hit Syria.

The country is also experiencing its worst prolonged period of violence since 2008, when it was just emerging from a bloody Sunni-Shiite sectarian war that left tens of thousands dead.

Clashes erupted in Anbar on Monday between police and militants in Humairah, an area in provincial capital Ramadi, when security forces attempted to reopen a police station, an AFP journalist said.

Fighting was also still raging in the Albubali and Khaldiyah areas between Ramadi and Fallujah, officials said.

Highway to Jordan, Syria reopened

Authorities, meanwhile, reopened a stretch of a highway to Jordan and Syria that had been closed for months by Sunni protesters demonstrating against the alleged mistreatment of their community by the Shiite-led government.

Analysts say that widespread Sunni anger towards the government has fuelled the surge of violence in the country.

Militants and anti-government tribes still hold two neighbourhoods in Ramadi, as well as all of Fallujah, a former insurgent stronghold just 60 kilometres from Baghdad.

Clashes still erupt periodically in Ramadi but civil servants have returned to work in the city, and residents who had fled Fallujah have since begun to come back.

ISIL has been active in the Anbar fighting, but so have anti-government tribesmen.

The army has for the most part stayed outside of Fallujah during the crisis, with analysts warning that any assault on the city would likely cause significant civilian casualties.

The Iraqi Red Crescent said it had provided humanitarian assistance to more than 8,000 families across Anbar but that upwards of 13,000 had fled Fallujah.

Fighting erupted in the Ramadi area on December 30, when security forces cleared a year-old Sunni Arab anti-government protest camp.

The violence spread to Fallujah, and militants moved in and seized the city and parts of Ramadi after security forces withdrew.

Iraq was also hit by violence outside Anbar Monday, with bombings in Baghdad and a shooting in the north killing at least eight people.