BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraqi security forces battled insurgents targeting the country’s main oil refinery and
claimed to regain partial control of a city near the Syrian border Wednesday, trying to blunt a weeklong
offensive by militants who diplomats fear may have abducted some 100 foreign workers.
The campaign by the al-Qaida-inspired Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant has raised the specter of the
sectarian warfare that nearly tore the country apart in 2006 and 2007 and the doubts that followed the
2003 U.S.-led invasion now haunt those trying to decide how to respond.
U.S. President Barack Obama will brief lawmakers later Wednesday at the White House on what options his
wary country could take.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, meanwhile, struck an optimistic tone after soldiers abandoned their
posts in the wake of the initial offensive, promising his nation would teach the attackers a “lesson.”

“We have now started our counteroffensive, regaining the initiative and striking back,” al-Maliki said.

Al-Maliki’s relatively upbeat assessment came as the military claimed its forces regained parts of the
strategic city of Tal Afar near the Syrian border, which Islamic State fighters captured Monday. Its
closeness to the Syrian border strengthens the Islamic State’s plan to carve out an “Islamic emirate”
stretching across the Iraq-Syria border.
It also came hours after the chief military spokesman, Lt. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, said government
forces repelled an attack by militants on the country’s largest oil refinery at Beiji, some 250
kilometers (155 miles) north of the capital, Baghdad.
Al-Moussawi said 40 attackers were killed in fighting there overnight and on Wednesday morning. There was
no independent confirmation of his claims, nor those on the Iraqi military retaking neighborhoods in Tal
Afar.
The Beiji refinery accounts for a little more than a quarter of the country’s entire refining capacity —
all of which goes toward domestic consumption for things like gasoline, cooking oil and fuel for power
stations. Any lengthy outage at Beiji risks long lines at the gas pump and electricity shortages, adding
to the chaos already facing Iraq.
In New Delhi, the Foreign Ministry said that 40 Indian construction workers have been kidnapped in Iraq.
Meanwhile, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said its diplomats were investigating claims that militants
abducted 60 foreign construction workers, including some 15 Turks, near the oil city of Kirkuk in
northern Iraq.
Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin said the government has been unable to contact the
workers.
There are about 10,000 Indian citizens working and living in Iraq. Akbaruddin said only about 100 are in
violent, insecure areas. That includes the construction workers near Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city,
as well as 46 Indian nurses working in a hospital in the Iraqi town of Tikrit. Both Mosul and Tikrit
were captured by the Islamic State last week.
Near Kirkuk, which Kurdish fighters took over from fleeing Iraqi soldiers amid the militants’ advance,
the Islamic State kidnapped 60 foreign construction workers building a hospital, Turkey’s private Dogan
news agency reported Wednesday. The agency based its report on an unnamed worker who was reportedly
freed by the militants.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry could not immediately confirm the report but said its embassy was
investigating.
The Sunni militants of the Islamic State have vowed to march to Baghdad and the Shiite holy cities of
Karbala and Najaf in the worst threat to Iraq’s stability since U.S. troops left. The three cities are
home to some of the most revered Shiite shrines. The Islamic State also has tried to capture Samarra
north of Baghdad, home to another major Shiite shrine.
Iran, a neighboring Shiite powerhouse, already has seen thousands volunteer to defend the shrines.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, speaking Wednesday to a crowd gathered at a stadium near his country’s
border with Iraq, said that the Islamic State and others would be defeated.
“We declare to all superpowers, their mercenaries, murderers and terrorists that the great Iranian nation
will not miss any effort in protecting these sacred sites,” Rouhani said.
Some 275 armed American forces are being positioned in and around Iraq to help secure U.S. assets as
Obama also considers an array of options for combating the Islamic militants, including airstrikes or a
contingent of special forces.
The White House has continued to emphasize that any military engagement remains contingent on the
government in Baghdad enacting political reforms and ending sectarian tensions, which have killed
thousands since late last year.
Republicans have been critical of Obama’s handling of Iraq, but Congress remains deeply divided over what
steps the U.S. can take militarily. Even lawmakers who voted in 2002 to give President George W. Bush
the authority to use military force to oust Saddam Hussein have expressed doubts about the effectiveness
of drone airstrikes and worry about Americans returning to the fight in a country split by sectarian
violence.
“Where will it lead and will that be the beginning or the end?” Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., said, when
asked about possible U.S. airstrikes. “We don’t know that. This underlying conflict has been going on
1,500 years between the Shias and the Sunnis and their allies. And I think whatever we do, it’s not
going to go away.”
During the United States’ eight-year presence in Iraq, American forces acted as a buffer between the two
Islamic sects, albeit with limited success. But U.S. forces fully withdrew at the end of 2011 when
Washington and Baghdad could not reach an agreement to extend the American military presence there.
Iraq has the world’s fifth-largest known crude oil reserves, with an estimated 143 billion barrels,
according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. It produced some 2.58 million barrels of oil
day in May, according to the Oil Ministry.
The price of oil neared $107 on Wednesday after easing slightly Tuesday.