PNN – An American media, quoting an Iraqi official, has claimed that there is a difference between the governments of Washington and Baghdad over the timing of the withdrawal of the international coalition forces from Iraq.
According to the report of Pakistan News Network, an American media, quoting an Iraqi official, has claimed that there is a difference between the governments of Washington and Baghdad over the timing of the withdrawal of the international coalition forces from Iraq.
The Iraqi government announced on Thursday evening that it is going to start official talks with the US to reduce the presence of US-led international coalition forces in Iraq.
The US Department of Defense confirmed in a statement without directly referring to its intention to reduce its presence in Iraq that the High Military Committee (HMC) working group meetings between the two sides will begin in the coming days.
America has been continuously present in Iraq since 2003. Although all US combat forces left Iraq in 2011, some of them returned to this country in 2014 under the pretext of fighting ISIS.
An Iraqi government official told The Associated Press on Thursday that Iraq had sent an official letter to the Safi Palace in November 2023 for the withdrawal of coalition forces.
This Iraqi official, who spoke to the American media on the condition of not revealing his name, claimed that the American officials disagreed with the Baghdad officials about the time of departure. The US has demanded a 2-5-year time frame for the withdrawal, while the Iraqis are demanding a faster withdrawal.
The number of non-American soldiers in Iraq reaches 2,400 people who have entered the country on behalf of other countries under the name of the anti-terrorism coalition, which has not been explicitly said about them until this moment.
On July 26, Baghdad and Washington agreed to withdraw American combat forces from Iraq by the end of this year, leaving only a few American forces to advise and train Iraqi forces.
The emphasis of the Iraqi people on expelling the US intensified when the US martyred Lt. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, and Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis, the deputy head of the Iraqi Popular Mobilization Organization. In response to this crime, the Iraqi parliament approved the plan to expel American soldiers from the country in January 2018.
Despite several rounds of strategic negotiations between Baghdad and Washington to end the US military presence in Iraq, the US is still present in Iraq in violation of this resolution. Although the Iraqi authorities have announced the beginning of the withdrawal process of the American military, and sometimes the news of the withdrawal of several American combat units is reported in the media.
An official of the US Ministry of Defense claimed in an interview with the Associated Press news agency that the talks between the two countries regarding the withdrawal time of the coalition forces have nothing to do with the recent US attacks on the resistance forces. He claimed that these negotiations have been going on for several months.
The Associated Press writes that even if the US withdraws from its bases in Iraq, they will probably maintain their presence in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, which has a better relationship with Washington.