Anti-IS coalition to discuss strategy at Paris meeting

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi will attend, but US Secretary of State John Kerry will miss the meeting because of a cycling accident.

The meeting comes after IS took the Iraqi town of Ramadi last month.

Iraq has become increasingly reliant on Shia volunteers to take on IS, raising fears over the possibility of worsening sectarian tensions.

With coalition air strikes against IS failing to have the impact many had hoped, talk is increasingly turning to Iraq's political terrain, the BBC's Lucy Williamson reports from Paris.

The new role for Shia fighters - many backed by Iran - in Sunni areas is adding to what France has called "an especially fragile" situation, our correspondent reports.

Ministers will discuss "lasting political solutions in order to resolve the Iraqi crisis," the French foreign ministry said.

The meeting comes a day after at least 45 Iraqi police officers were killed in an IS attack in Iraq's Anbar province.

A senior security source in Anbar told the BBC on Monday the "final touches" were being put to a plan to drive IS out of Ramadi and that it would begin within days.

The source said six Iranian-made rocket launchers had been transported to the frontline in Anbar and that 3,000 fighters had completed basic training near Habbaniya military base, east of Ramadi, in preparation for the assault on the city.

As well as discussing the military situation, the meeting in Paris is expected to address threats to cultural heritage, protection of persecuted minorities and the refugee crisis created by the conflict.

IS has already destroyed ancient sites in Iraq that pre-date Islam and there are fears it may do the same to the Roman-era ruins in Palmyra.

On Monday the BBC revealed footage appearing to show IS militants torturing a 14-year-old Syrian boy.

The footage, filmed by an IS defector, shows the boy being beaten while he hangs by his wrists.

The UN has accused IS and other armed groups in Syria and Iraq of torturing and killing children.

(BBC)