Iraq and the United States held their first round of talks on Saturday about the future of American and other foreign forces in Iraq, and Baghdad hopes the talks will lead to a timeline for reducing the presence.
About 2,500 U.S. troops remain deployed in Iraq as part of the international coalition against Islamic State formed in 2014. During the year, jihadist groups took control of large swathes of Iraq and neighboring Syria.
But since the Israeli-Hamas war began in October, the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq and Syria has faced frequent attacks by Iranian-aligned groups, including U.S. retaliatory strikes and U.S. attacks on Iraqi territory. This has led to accusations of “invasion”.
Talks between the two countries had been planned since August, but the unstable situation has left Iraq’s prime minister relying on support from Iranian-allied parties and demanding that Iran leave the coalition.
Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani’s office released a photo of him with senior officials from both the Iraqi army and the US-led coalition.
Sudani’s office said in a statement that their joint committee “began work in Baghdad today to review the global coalition’s mission against Daesh,” using the Arabic acronym for Islamic State.
“Military experts will oversee the conclusion of the Global Coalition Against Daesh military mission, ten years after it began and after successfully accomplishing the mission in cooperation with Iraqi security forces and armed forces. be.”
Farhad Alaluddin, Sudani’s foreign affairs adviser, told AFP: “The duration of the negotiations will depend on the negotiations and their progress.”
“Iraq is engaging with other countries in the United Nations towards bilateral agreements that are in the best interests of Iraq and these countries,” Alaluddin said.
– “Clear timeline” –
The U.S. government announced Thursday that it had reached an agreement with Baghdad to establish a “specialized working group of military and defense experts” as part of a joint commission established under the agreement with Baghdad.
The three working groups will consider “the level of threat posed by ISIS, operational and environmental requirements, and the growing capabilities of Iraqi security forces,” Sudani’s office said.
On Thursday, Pentagon Deputy Spokesperson Sabrina Singh acknowledged that U.S. military presence in Iraq “will definitely be part of the discussion going forward.”
Iraq’s Foreign Ministry expects that a “concrete and clear schedule” will eventually be drawn up to begin the gradual reduction of (coalition) advisers in Iraq.
There have been more than 150 attacks targeting coalition forces since mid-October, many of them claimed by Iraq’s Islamic Resistance Movement, a loose alliance of Iran-linked groups opposed to U.S. support for Israel in the Gaza war. are doing.
IS declared a “caliphate” in 2014 and ruled brutally until the Iraqi army, backed by the U.S.-led coalition, was defeated in late 2017. However, jihadist groups continue to carry out sporadic attacks against the military and police.
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