The persistence of a sense of "Iraqiness" could still be the foundation of a better future for Iraq's people, says Janan Al-Asady.

On the eve of the tenth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad, former organiser in the Stop the War movement and Iraq hostage negotiator, Anas Altikriti, says Iraq has never been closer to a civil war.

The rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran is at the heart of Syria's destructive stalemate. This proxy conflict, with Baghdad providing crucial help to Tehran, highlights the scale of the blowback from the United States's war in Iraq.

The massive 2003 public campaign against Blair’s attempt to take the UK into war against Iraq demanded a war powers rule in Parliament to ensure that no government could ever again commit the country to war without Parliament’s approval. A decade later, the fight goes on for the ruling.

The gap between the invaders' expectations and the reality that emerged in Iraq was immense. But even as the ground war opened on 20 March 2003, there were clear indications of the carnage to come.

Still they continue to caricature and minimise the opposition at the time as they sense the threat to the balance of power. But the fact is this. Without the battering ram of the Murdoch press especially, and media generally, the UK Parliament could not have voted for the Iraq invasion.

From a potentially subjective point of view, a Kurd could argue that the long hardship and series of disasters inflicted upon the people of Iraq are direct consequences of the complacency and indifference embedded in the foreign policy of the superpowers.