Iraq crisis: EU holds emergency meeting to discuss arming Kurds
The possibility of arming Kurds in Iraq is being discussed by EU foreign ministers today at an emergency meeting in Brussels.
Around 20 ministers will talk about the possibility of giving weapons to the Peshmerga fighters – the Kurdish forces – in order to stop the advance of the Islamic State (IS) militant group in the north of the country.
The UN has said that there are currently over a million Iraqis who have been displaced from their homes since the Islamist insurgency began.
France called the meeting, after foreign minister Laurent Fabius said that the EU was being too complacent over the Iraq crisis.
"When there are people dying… you have to come back from your holidays," he said in a letter to EU foreign policy chief Baroness Catherine Ashton earlier this week.
Two days ago, the European Union failed to agree on a joint position on supplying weapons to Iraqi Kurds battling Islamic State armed fighters, but has said individual members could send arms in coordination with Baghdad.
France has already started to provide arms to the Kurds, as has the US. The latter has also conducted some air strikes against IS in the north.
Germany has made a promise to provide non-lethal military aid to the Iraqi army, the Czech Republic says that it is working "on the preparation of military supplies" for the Kurds, and the Netherlands has said that it would consider arming both the Kurds and the Iraqi troops.
The UK is the latest EU member state to decide that it will send arms to the minority group, as foreign secretary Philip Hammond will make clear at today's meeting. Previously, Britain had said that its only involvement would be to transport weapons provided by others.
On Sunday, Iraqi Kurdish President Masoud Barzani urged the international community to provide weapons to the Kurds so that they could be better equipped to deal with the insurgents.