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Iraqi premiere announces funds, training in battlefield city

Nuri Al Maliki meets with provincial officials and leaders of powerful local tribes in Anbar province.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki announced over $83 million in construction funds and training for allied tribal militia during a visit on Saturday to Ramadi, where militants have held territory for weeks.

It was Maliki’s first announced trip to Anbar province since militants and anti-government tribesmen seized control of parts of Ramadi and all of Fallujah to its east at the start of the year, in a major setback for his government.

Maliki’s spokesman Ali Mussawi said that the premier met with provincial officials and leaders of powerful local tribes.

“We came to confirm our support to our people and our tribes in Anbar,” Mussawi quoted Maliki as saying in a speech.

He also announced 100 billion dinars (around $83 million) in construction funds for Anbar province, and said that security forces would provide training to pro-government tribal fighters, Mussawi said.

The takeovers in Anbar are the first time that anti-government forces have exercised such open control in major cities since the bloody insurgency that followed the US-led invasion of 2003.

The prospects of a quick resolution to the crisis seem slim, with Deputy Prime Minister Hussein Al Shahristani saying the strategy for retaking Fallujah is to surround it and wait for Sunni Arab gunmen to run short of weapons and equipment.

Iraq is facing its worst violence since 2008, when the country was just emerging from a brutal period of sectarian killings that left tens of thousands dead.