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BAGHDAD/KIRKUK, Iraq — Resurgent militants, ethnic land disputes or regular field burning? Iraq's northern farmlands are on fire, but the area's complex patchwork of grievances has made it hard to identify the culprits.

Farmers in the country's breadbasket had been hoping for bumper wheat and barley harvests in May and June, following heavy winter rains.

Instead, many saw their hopes turned to ash. 

The Iraqi fire service says that in a single month, 236 fires destroyed 5,183 hectares of farmland — the equivalent of more than 7,000 football pitches.

The blazes hit four northern provinces, all of which had been at least partly controlled by the Daesh group and have remained prey to the terrorist’s sleeper cells.

Daesh has continued to carry out hit-and-run attacks despite losing its Iraqi foothold in late 2017 and its last Syrian enclave just a few months ago.

Indeed, the group was quick to claim responsibility for the fires.

In its weekly online magazine Al Naba, it said its fighters had destroyed "hundreds of hectares" owned by "apostates" in the provinces of Kirkuk, Nineveh, Salahaddin and Diyala.

Officials in those areas told AFP they believed Daesh was responsible for at least some of the fires. 

"Daesh fighters set fire to the fields because the farmers refused to pay them zakat," said one police officer in Kirkuk, referring to a tax imposed under Islamic law.

"They came by motorcycle, started the fires and also planted explosives that would go off when residents or firefighters got there," he told AFP.

The mines have killed at least five people and wounded 10 in Kirkuk province.

 Burning questions 

But experts are reluctant to blame all of the fires on pyro-terrorists.

The extreme heat of northern Iraq, where temperatures have been hitting 45ºC has created tinder-dry conditions in which a stray cigarette can easily set a field alight.

Farmers are also known to burn off vegetation in fields left fallow to make the soil more fertile for future seasons.

And the longstanding tug-of-war over land in northern Iraq likely plays a role, said security expert Hisham Al Hashemi.

"Daesh claimed dozens of fires, but the others were certainly the product of land disputes, most often among tribes," he told AFP. 

Kirkuk, whose status is disputed by federal government and autonomous Kurdish regional administration, has witnessed periodic violence between Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen.

So has Nineveh, which has seen 119 fires in recent weeks, 16 of them on Thursday alone, according to its agricultural department chief Duraid Hekmat.

"There could be a variety of reasons — it could be deliberate or just an act of God, it could be negligence or personal disputes," he said. 

Nineveh was among the provinces hardest hit by Daesh, which seized its capital Mosul as its headquarters in 2014 and slaughtered thousands of members of its Yazidi religious minority.

"We're facing a huge shortage of fire trucks. We have 50-55 vehicles but it's not enough for 1.5 million hectares," said Zakaria Ahmad, deputy head of Nineveh's fire service.

 Harvest hopes dashed 

The fires have been devastating for farmers banking on a good harvest to pay off their debts.

Around a third of Iraqis rely on agriculture for their livelihoods, with the government subsidising seeds and guaranteeing to buy part of the harvest. 

Kirkuk's 200,000 hectares produce an average 650,000 tonnes every year, according to Burhan Assi, who heads the provincial council's agricultural service. 

"This year, thanks to the rains, we were expecting around 4 tonnes per hectare, compared to just two last year because of the drought," he told AFP.

But most of that has been destroyed in fires he called "the biggest, most widespread we've ever seen". 

Raad Sami, who farms land in southern Kirkuk, lost 90 hectares of wheat to the fires, which he blamed on Daesh. 

"We had been waiting for the end of the season to reap our harvest and sell it to pay back our debts," he said. 

"Right now, the government needs to compensate us."

Youssef Ahmad, a Turkmen farmer, does not know who burned his fields.

But he does not much care. 

"Either it was Daesh, people who want to seize our land, or the result of a dispute between Baghdad and the Kurds," he said.

DÜSSELDORF, Germany — A Tunisian man and his German wife went on trial Friday, charged with planning a foiled biological bomb attack in Germany with the deadly poison ricin.

Sief Allah H., 30, and his wife Yasmin, 43, were arrested a year ago by an anti-terrorist squad that found 84 milligrammes of the toxin in their Cologne apartment.

The arrests likely prevented what would have been Germany's first biological attack, said Holger Muench, head of the BKA Federal Criminal Police Office, at the time.

Federal prosecutors said the couple had "for a long time identified with the aims and values of the foreign terrorist organisation Daesh".

They decided in 2017 to detonate an explosive in a large crowd, "to kill and wound the largest possible number of people", said prosecutors ahead of the trial in Duesseldorf.

Chief Prosecutor Verena Bauer told the court the couple had planned to build a bomb with ricin and steel balls, and that they had purchased "nearly all the required parts" for the explosive.

Lawyers for the defendants said the accused did not plan to make statements in court. 

Sief Allah H.'s defence meanwhile filed a motion against judge Jan van Lessen, claiming bias.

 Hamster test 

The pair had allegedly researched various forms of explosives before deciding on the deadly poison.

They ordered 3,300 castor beans over the Internet and successfully made a small amount of ricin, a poison 6,000 times more potent than cyanide that can kill if swallowed, inhaled or injected, according to prosecutors.

Investigators also found 250 metal balls, two bottles of nail polish remover as well as wires soldered on light bulbs.

Only the raid and arrests prevented "the production of a larger quantity of ricin and the building of an explosive", said prosecutors.

The couple were caught after a tip-off from the US Central Intelligence Agency, which had noticed the large online purchase of castor seeds, according to German media reports.

News weekly Der Spiegel has reported that the couple were believed to have already been radicalised when they met online in 2014.

Sief Allah H., a former street vendor and labourer in Tunisia, in 2015 married Yasmin H., an unemployed doctor's assistant and mother of seven children from four different fathers, the report said.

The husband had been in contact with radicals and tried twice in 2017 to travel to Syria via Turkey.

His wife helped him with flight and hotel bookings, but both trips failed.

Sief Allah H. also volunteered to help the Daesh in their propaganda work, and did so in early 2018 by publishing material of the group online, said prosecutors.

Later, the couple decided to prepare an attack in Germany itself, and also bought a hamster to test the potency of the ricin.

"Very concrete preparations had been made for an act with a... biological bomb, which is a first for Germany," said Muench.

If convicted of the charges of serious violence endangering the country, the defendants could each face up to 15 years in jail.

Two suspects were also arrested in August last year in Tunisia in connection with the case.

Germany, Europe's biggest economy, remains on high alert after several deadly attacks claimed by the Daesh group.

The worst attack, a 2016 truck rampage through a Berlin Christmas market by Tunisian asylum seeker Anis Amri, claimed 12 lives.

The trial is expected to last until the end of August.

ALGIERS — Hundreds of demonstrators packed the centre of the Algerian capital on on Friday calling on the interim president to quit a day after he called for dialogue aimed at fixing a new date for elections as soon as possible.

A vote planned for July 4 was cancelled on Sunday in the face of widespread protests as demonstrators who forced the ouster of veteran president Abdelaziz Bouteflika in April continued to demand a broad political overhaul.

Algeria's constitutional council said it was impossible to hold elections to choose a successor to Bouteflika after the only two candidates were rejected.

Interim Algerian President Abdelkader Bensalah on Thursday urged the political class and civil society to hold an "inclusive dialogue" aimed at fixing a new date for elections "as soon as possible".

But demonstrators who flooded central Algiers for the 16th consecutive Friday continued to demand change in the North African country, chanting "we're fed up with these rulers".

They also called on Bensalah and army chief Gen. Ahmed Gaid Salah — who has become the country's power broker — to "clear off" as police deployed massively across the centre of the capital.

The protesters have been staunchly against presidential polls being held as long as the ruling elite, which they accuse of having links to Bouteflika, remain in power.

"The only condition for dialogue is that the current rulers must all go," Maasi, a 26-year-old unemployed man who only gave his first name, said in response to Bensalah's call for talks as he took part in Friday's protest.

Hamid, a civil servant, added that any dialogue "should be with the real holder of power, and that means the army. Bensalah does not make the decisions".

Dalia Ghanem Yazbeck, a researcher at the Carnegie Middle East Centre based in Beirut, said the protesters won points with the cancellation of the July 4 elections.

But on the other hand, she said, the planned polls "were a non-event because from a logistical point of view it would have been impossible to organise the elections".

While Gaid Salah had pushed for the polls, July 4 looked increasingly implausible as no major party nominated a candidate.

A major obstacle emerged when some mayors and magistrates said they would not take part in organising the elections.

The two unknown figures who put themselves forward — Abdelhakim Hamadi and Hamid Touahri — had not been expected to gather the necessary 60,000 voter signatures to validate their bid for office.

Yazbeck said "no one wants to run in the election and take part in this masquerade, and it is clear that the authorities cannot agree on a candidate to represent them".

"The authorities are improvising. There are no long term solutions and despite what they thought, the [protest] movement is not petering out," she added.

Algerians have been demonstrating since February, after an ailing Bouteflika announced plans to seek a fifth term in office.

Demonstrations also took place in several other Algerian cities and towns, according to social media reports, although it was not immediately clear how many protesters took to the streets nationwide on Friday as official figures were unavailable.

But AFP reporters said the rally in Algiers was massive with demonstrators flooding several major streets in the capital.

DUBAI — A dispute over control of biometric data between the World Food Programme and Yemen's Houthi group is straining humanitarian efforts and threatens to disrupt aid distribution in a country already on the brink of famine. 

In an unusually strong statement the UN agency, which feeds more than 10 million people a month across the Arabian Peninsula's poorest nation, said last month it is considering suspending deliveries due to fighting, insecurity and interference in its work.

The WFP has said the Iran-aligned Houthis, who control the capital Sanaa, were hampering the rollout of a WFP biometric system to identify those in most need. 

The biometric system — using iris scanning, fingerprints or facial recognition — is already used in areas controlled by Yemen’s internationally recognised government, which is backed by a Saudi-led coalition of Arab states. 

Sources familiar with the discussions said Houthi leaders asked the agency to stop the registration process in early April after realising the new system bypasses Sanaa’s supervision.

The Houthis said the process should be run by the Yemeni Social Welfare Fund, a Sanaa-based agency which coordinates with international aid groups.

Since discovering in December 2018 that donated food in Houthi areas was being systematically diverted through a local partner connected to Houthi authorities, the WFP has pressed the Houthis harder to implement a biometric registration system used globally to combat corruption in aid distribution.

“The continued blocking by some within the Houthi leadership of the biometric registration... is undermining an essential process that would allow us to independently verify that food is reaching... people on the brink of famine,” WFP spokesman Herve Verhoosel said. 

Mohammed Ali Al Houthi, head of the Houthis’ supreme revolutionary committee, told Reuters the WFP insisted on controlling the data in violation of Yemeni law. 

Cholera has killed thousands

“We have proposed many solutions including to distribute cards exclusively to the beneficiaries and to use cash instead of food aid... but they refused,” he said.

He called for an independent investigation because the WFP receives money from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who lead the anti-Houthi alliance. The agency says it remains independent regardless of its source of funding. 

Another point of contention between the WFP and Houthi authorities has been 51,000 tonnes of UN wheat — inaccessible since September and at risk of rotting — stored in Yemen’s main port of Hodeidah.

Both parties to Yemen’s four-year conflict have used access to aid and food as a political tool, exacerbating what the United Nations have called the world’s worst humanitarian crisis where cholera has already killed thousands.

Aid agencies operating in Yemen have told Reuters that food and medical supplies can be held at ports and frontline borders for up to six months due to bureaucracy from both warring sides.

Verhoosel said 8,200 tonnes of wheat was recently prevented from unloading at Hodeida Port by Yemeni food quality monitors, even though there was no indication of problems. 

He also said that in April 160 trucks carrying food aid from the southern port of Aden to the Houthi-controlled north were detained at checkpoints between government and Houthi territory. They have since been released but another 21 WFP trucks have been detained in Houthi areas.

Other agencies say the problems, including harassment of staff, interference with distribution list, difficulties getting visas and restrictions on movement, have deepened in Houthi areas in recent months. 

“We share the frustrations described by the WFP... and we reiterate calls for authorities in Yemen to allow humanitarian agencies to do our jobs,” said Suze van Meegen of the Norwegian Refugee Council.

KHARTOUM — Sudan's opposition on Tuesday rejected a plan by its military rulers to hold elections within nine months, a day after the worst bout of violence since President Omar Al Bashir was overthrown in April.

At least 35 people were killed on Monday when security forces stormed a protest camp outside the Defence Ministry in central Khartoum, said doctors linked to the opposition.

The Transitional Military Council (TMC) that has ruled since Bashir's ousting cancelled all agreements reached during talks with the main opposition alliance on setting up a transitional administration. The sides had agreed on forming a parliament and a government that would prepare for elections after three years.

Madani Abbas Madani, a leader of the Declaration of Freedom and Change Forces (DFCF) opposition alliance, said an open-ended civil disobedience campaign would continue to try to force the council from power.

"What happened [on Monday] — the killing and injuring of protesters, the humiliation — was a systematic and planned attempt to impose repression on the Sudanese people," Madani told Reuters.

The main protest organizers, the Sudanese Professionals Association (SPA), called for an international committee to investigate the deaths in what it branded a “massacre”.

Khartoum was very tense on Tuesday, with many roads barricaded by protesters, shops shut and streets mostly empty. Security forces were trying to clear the barricades, a Reuters witness said.

Rapid Support Forces (RSF) vehicles were patrolling the streets in Omdurman, on the other side of the River Nile from Khartoum, and firing into the air.

Social media users said soldiers from the RSF, a paramilitary force led by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, the military council’s deputy head, were firing into the air to “terrorise” people and beating demonstrators with batons. There were reports of at least one person killed and several injured.

One posting showed a young man describe how he was beaten up at Khartoum University, sustaining a broken arm. He displayed a partially shaven head and marks of lashing on his back. It was not immediately possible to independently verify the report.

TMC under pressure

Sudan has been rocked by unrest since December, when anger over rising bread prices and cash shortages broke into sustained protests that culminated in the armed forces removing Bashir after three decades in office.

But talks between the TMC and DFCF ground to a halt amid deep differences over who would lead a transition to democracy that both sides had agreed would last for three years.

Protest leaders have demanded proper preparations for elections during a transitional period led by a civilian administration.

“We believe that the matter is now in the hands of the Sudanese people,” said Khalid Omar Yousef, a DFCF leader. “This regime will fall, no matter what.”

The SPA also rejected the establishment of a governmental committee to investigate Monday’s deaths, spokesman Amjad Farid said, adding that the TMC was accused of targeting protesters.

Council spokesman Lt. Gen. Shams El Din Kabbashi denied this charge and said security forces had pursued “unruly elements” who fled to the protest site and caused chaos.

In a televised address early on Tuesday, TMC head Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah Al Burhan said the opposition coalition was equally responsible for the delay in reaching a final agreement.

The council has decided to cancel all agreements with the protest groups and called for elections within nine months under regional and international supervision, he said.

“Gaining legitimacy and a mandate does not come but through the ballot box,” Burhan said, adding that a government would be formed immediately to run the country until elections are held.

Burhan said he regretted the violence and said it would be investigated.

Risk of escalation

The security forces’ operation drew condemnation from Europe, the United States and the African Union.

The Democratic Alliance of Lawyers, part of the SPA, on Tuesday urged “some Arab countries” not to interfere in Sudanese affairs and to drop their support for the TMC.

The alliance’s comments appeared aimed at Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, which analysts say are trying to shore up their influence in Sudan following Bashir’s overthrow.

The Soufan Group, a security and intelligence think-tank, said the violence could swiftly escalate into civil war.

“There are clear parallels to some of the Arab Spring protests that eventually progressed to full-blown insurgencies, including Syria, where indiscriminate shelling of civilians by the military initially galvanised protest movements that helped launch a broader uprising,” it said in an analysis. 

However, Hamid Eltgani Ali, a professor at the American University in Cairo, predicted that the protest movement would succeed in forcing the military to step down. There were two competing visions for Sudan’s future, he told Reuters.

“The vision of hate and division is led by the Janjaweed [militias]and military resisting to preserve their economic interests they enjoyed during Bashir’s rule, while the vision of hope is led by professional associations and syndicates. They want a democratic, open Sudan with a strong developmental vision,” Ali said.

BEIRUT — A militant attacked a security patrol in Lebanon's northern city of Tripoli on Monday night, killing two police officers and two soldiers before blowing himself up, officials said.

Interior Minister Raya Al Hassan described it as a "lone wolf attack", though authorities cancelled Eid Al Fitr celebrations in the coastal city on Tuesday and promised to secure it.

Major attacks had dropped off in Lebanon since a wave of militant bombings — many of them linked to the war in neighbouring Syria — struck parts of the country from 2013 to 2016.

The gunman threw a bomb at security forces in a government building and opened fire on a patrol, two security sources told Reuters. The attacker had earlier been in jail on charges of belonging to Daesh, one of the sources said. 

The militant then detonated an explosive belt after soldiers raided a residential building where he was holed up, the army said. 

Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Al Hariri gave his condolences to the families of the dead and said all measures must be taken to protect Tripoli and "weed out any remnants of terrorism".

Interior Minister Raya Al Hassan, described the attack as "a new form of terrorism". 

“Can I tell you we can curb it 100 per cent? We can’t curb it. Countries that are perhaps more advanced than us have not been able to,” she told a press conference.

The head of Lebanon’s internal security forces, accompanying her, said the agency constantly keeps tabs on suspects and sleeper cells.

“But when someone reaches a level of desperation in some cases, and carries out a crazy action, this leads us to not know about him [ahead of time],” Gen. Imad Othman told reporters.

Othman said the man had been in prison for a year and a month before being released, without giving further details.

ISTANBUL — President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday said Turkey would not withdraw from a deal made with Russia to buy an S-400 missile defence system despite US threats of "devastating" consequences.

Ankara's desire to buy the S-400 has been a major source of contention between NATO allies Turkey and the United States, which has threatened sanctions after months of warnings. 

"We have made an agreement [with Russia]. We are determined," Erdogan was quoted as saying by the official Anadolu news agency.

"There is nothing like backtracking from that," he told journalists after prayers at an Istanbul mosque. 

Last week a top Pentagon official said the consequences would be "devastating" for Turkey's joint F-35 fighter programme and its cooperation with NATO if the country went ahead with plans to buy the Russian anti-aircraft weapon system.

Kathryn Wheelbarger, acting assistant secretary of defence for international security affairs, said the planned purchase would damage Turkey's ability to work with the Western alliance, and force Washington to hit the country with sanctions against arms deals with Russia.

She said the US administration, even if it does not want to punish Turkey for the purchase, could be forced to do so by a Congress unsympathetic to Ankara.

Last month Turkish Defence Minister Hulusi Akar said the country was already "preparing" for US sanctions. 

S-400s over US Patriots

US officials said they expect Turkey to opt for the US Patriot missiles instead, arguing that would then allow the F-35 programme to continue.

Turkey plans to buy 100 US F-35s, and some Turkish pilots have already started training with counterparts in the US.

Erdogan said on Tuesday he told the US that Ankara would take steps to buy the Patriots only if its conditions of delivery were as positive as Russia's.

"But unfortunately we haven't received a positive proposal from the American side on the subject of Patriots like the S400s from Russia," he added.

Turkey has defied mounting pressure from its NATO allies and said the purchase from Moscow was a "done deal".

Erdogan on Wednesday spoke with US President Donald Trump by phone and, according to the Turkish leader's office, they discussed Ankara's previous offer to form a "joint working group" on the missile system.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Tuesday said Turkey did not have to warn Russia, when asked if Ankara informed Moscow of its proposal to create a joint working group with Washington.

"Turkey did not have to warn us. This is not our business. Our business and that of our Turkish partners is to conclude the transaction over the delivery of S400s, which is being carried out," he said. 

"Turkey can talk about that with any third country." 

The Russian defence system is planned to be delivered as early as June or July. 

Erdogan and Trump are due to meet on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan, at the end of June.

In addition to the issue of the S-400, Turkish-US ties are already under strain over US support for a Syrian Kurdish militia — viewed as "terrorists" by Ankara.