ISIL fighters vow to march on Iraq's capital

June 13, 2014 00:59

Fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant have vowed to march on Baghdad, as Iraq's parliament failed to agree the declaration of a nationwide state of emergency.

"We will march toward Baghdad because we have an account to settle there," said the armed group's spokesman on Thursday in an audio recording posted on the internet.

The statement could not be independently verified. In a sign of ISIL's confidence, he even boasted that its fighters would take the southern Shia cities of Karbala and Najaf, which hold two of the holiest shrines for Shia Muslims, following the fall of cities in the Sunni north.

Its boasts come as Iraq's parliament failed to reach a quorum on Thursday to vote on a nationwide state of emergency. Most of those boycotting parliament were from the country's Sunni and Kurdish factions, who oppose giving extraordinary powers to the Shia prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki.

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