Mauritania fabricates a crisis with Iraq to cover resentment over its relations with Israel

The Mauritanian authorities on Wednesday banned the Iraqi-backed al-Tali'ya Party and accused it of carrying out acts which "violate the law and the public security."

Sources at the Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott, expected the government to take a decision to expel Iraqi Ambassador Kazem al-Rawi.

Meanwhile the secretary general of al-Tali'ya Party, Ahmad Ould Bebanah, denied the accusations raised by the government. He said, "Our party is working according to the law and does not take orders from any side, internal or external."

He called on the government to "give evidence of what it had said." He accused the "regime" of President Mu'weyah as being "besieged after it rushed to Israel and after the people in Mauritania categorically refused his rush."

Ould Babaneh said that holding Iraq responsible for what is taking place in Mauritania, while Iraq is in the Near East, will lead to nothing, adding, "The people of Mauritania have more confidence in Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and clinging to him" than the confidence put in the "bankrupted" regime of President Mu'weyah.