Military evacuated from Baghdad. Crosetto: "Priority to security, here is the proposal for Hormuz"

During an interview with "Diario del Giorno", Defense Minister Guido Crosetto announced that, during the night in Baghdad, "through and with the agreement of our intelligence services, whom I thank for their cooperation with us", some Italian soldiers were evacuated "in total safety: they have already left Iraq and have already arrived in Kurdistan and now they will arrive in Turkey and then return to Italy".

The Defense Minister added that the recall concerns "almost entirely from Baghdad" and that additional soldiers will be brought back "still some from Erbil, still some from Kuwait: those who remain must have the guarantee of safety and have something to do, all the others have been brought back and will be brought back shortly".

"In these days what concerns us, more than the Unifil mission, is ensuring the safety of the people who represent the United Nations in a peace mission, who are our military and those of other contingents. This is something we have managed to do so far".

Regarding the Lebanese dossier, Crosetto emphasized: "There are two alternatives, either somehow the Hezbollah are disarmed by a multilateral United Nations mission or they are disarmed by Israel through war, as is happening now".

As for the maritime fronts, the minister explained that "the Aspides mission will take care of the Red Sea and that can be reinforced to ensure the tranquility in the passage of the Red Sea and in the Suez Canal".

Different is the chapter related to the Strait of Hormuz: "It's not that the countries said 'no' to securing Hormuz, they said 'no' to a mission that could seem almost like an entry into war in that channel. Meanwhile, what all countries hope for is a multilateral, international mission that can somehow guarantee security in Hormuz. There should be a UN, perhaps the United Nations should take the lead on this. A mission that secures Hormuz would manage to bring almost the whole world to the table. Why not try to do it?"