ISIL seizes Saddam Hussein's former chemical weapons plant

Islamist militants in Iraq have occupied Saddam Hussein's former chemical weapons production facility, which contains a stockpile of old chemical weapon, the US government has told US media.

US military officials don't believe the militants from the group also known as ISIL would be able to create a new weapon from the stockpiles left behind at the Muthanna complex about 60 kilometres northwest of Baghdad, according to the Wall Street Journal. Nonetheless, the rapid loss of control of the key site in Iraq has unsettled US authorities after weeks of rapid gains by the Sunni militants.

"We remain concerned about the seizure of any military site by the ISIL," US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said, according to the media outlet. "We do not believe that the complex contains CW materials of military value and it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to safely move the materials."

However, US officials told the WSJ that had they known Iraq would become so destabilised after the 2011 pullout of US troop, they would not have left the stockpiles in place. The Islamic state in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), an offshoot of Al-Qaeda-linked fighters in Syria, has rapidly swept through large parts of Iraq in recent weeks, undermining security in the country that is riven by sectarian division.

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/world/isil-seizes-saddam-husseins-former-chemical-weapons-plant-20140620-zsfm4.html