and they are beginning to see that the government in baghdad is now very interested in them. we re seeing mr. al bad di goin out, linking up with the tribal sheikhs and sunni tribes. that never happened when i was there with mr. maliki. but we were talking about this sunni/shia divide. and that plays into this as well, not just the makeup of the military, but you have the shia militias backed by iran which have made many of the advances that have taken place over the past couple months. anderson, it s worse than that. it s come out that head of the kutz force. elite iranian forces. this is the same group that blew up the marines in 83, kidnapped one of my bosses in beirut, is really a bad guy, is in tikrit today, sort of managing the assault on the city. so what message does that send? exactly, saying look, this
base in mogadishu saying it was their revenge for usair strike killing their leader in september. both groups have stated the intent to attack the united states. the only question may be, when and if they would make their move. barbara starr, cnn, the pentagon. u.s. senator john mccain live tweeted his trip to baghdad friday. he sent out a photo of his arrival followed by a picture with a meeting with the iraqi parliament speaker. he also met with six sunni tribal sheikhs to discuss how to fight the isis militants. mr. mccain was in kabul the day before. ukraine s government swapped prisoners of war on friday with pro-russia separatists. a few hundred prisoners were exchanges between the two sides part of petro poroshenko s plan to end a pro-russian uprising in the east we have been covering here for months now.
so that s kind of the name of the game. obviously, the rallying the shia militia, this is not good news for us. this is a really further development in this sectarian war. i think it s important to understand that to be sure, maliki s been a big part of the problem, but the sunnis have never really accepted shia rule. they ve never accepted it for centuries. i think it s going to be hard for them to accept any shia leader. so that is a really is a tall order. we have a sectarian conflict. moreover, as you ve seen with isis collecting money from various banks in northwestern iraq, this money is used not so much for what we are concerned about, that is terrorist assaults eventually on the united states or something, but it s used to make sure the various sunni sheikhs in anbar and elsewhere are well lube bra da
baghdad. the u.s. and iraq are looking for ways to stop them. let s bring in our senior international correspondent, nic robertson. also joining us jim sciutto and michael holmes. nic, i understand you just spoke to a sunni tribal leader who represents a lot of those fighters involved in the battles right now. what are you hearing? he s a political representative from the council of tribal sheikhs in iraq. the reason that s s isis fighte made such a gain is that there was an agreement and plan that they would get the support from the sunni tribes. they have completely different agendas. isis wants a counter faith. the fry balance leader what they
turn them and get them to support the government in the baghdad. so that is proving much more problematic right now. and many of those sunni sheikhs are really afraid to strike out against the al qaeda elements. so it s very discouraging news for people who have worked so hard to try to stabilize that country and certainly i think dangerous. chris, you re talking about sunni militants. they re angry the way they re being treated by the shiite government of nuri al malakar. and now they re an ined with al qaeda. how do you stop something like that? you know, i mean, i realize esthere s certainly a body of thought that somehow the shia-led government under nuri al malaki has not done enough to be inclusive of the sunnis and that this has led to some frustrations but i would encourage the viewers to understand this problem is embedded in a broader region,