On January 16, 2016 the Casimir Pulaski Foundation, in cooperation with the Embassy of Iraq in Warsaw, organised a debate entitled “Iraq on a war with terrorism”. The debate was linked with an exhibition of photographs from the front-line of fights against “Islamic State”. The discussion concerned the current situation in Iraq and prospects for stabilisation. It has been the second event organised by the Pulaski Foundation and the Iraqi Embassy – the previous one in November last year was attended by Ph. D. Ibrahim al-Eshaiker al-Jaafari, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Iraq.
The event gathered among the audience representatives of the Amed Forces, state institutions and international organisations. It was started by the President of the Pulaski Foundation, Zbigniew Pisarski, who underlined that Polish-Iraqi relations should be a very important element of the Polish foreign policy. President Pisarski mentioned that the economic cooperation between both countries has a huge potential and Poland ought to take advantage of it.
The particpants also listened to the speech of His Excellency Mr. Ambassador Assad Abu Gulal, who presented a vision of the Iraqi government after displacing ISIS from the country. Additionally, Mohammad Yass al-Hadithi from the Iraqi Embassy presented detailed report on actions of the Iraqi Army against the ISIS. The main point of the presentation was an analysis of the military actions during the Mosul liberation from the Islamists’ hands.
Witold Repetowicz, the expert of the Pulaski Foundation, told about his experience from journeys to Iraq (the last one was in November 2016). He pointed out that Polish media seldom send their correspondents to Iraq what makes people writing about this country uninformed about real situation on the ground. Witold Repetowicz said that today Iraq does not remind the country from the past – in most places, especially in Baghdad, life is safe and normal as well as Iraq is on the way to stabilisation. Moreover, the government cares about democratic freedoms, such as freedom of speech and free media.