Washington-Sana
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced that the US military mission in Iraq will end by the end of this year.
And the website of the US Department of Defense (the Pentagon) quoted Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby as saying that Austin stressed during his meeting yesterday with his Iraqi counterpart Jumaa Inad al-Jubouri on the sidelines of the annual Manama International Dialogue Conference on Regional Security in Bahrain that “the United States will fulfill the commitments it made during the Iraqi strategic dialogue.” The US-concluded meeting last July, including ensuring that there will be no US forces with a combat role by the end of this year in Iraq.
Austin considered that the US forces are still in Iraq to support the Iraqi security forces at the invitation of the Iraqi government, noting that the two sides discussed the next phase of the US forces in Iraq, which will focus on the advisory role, providing assistance and sharing intelligence information with the Iraqi security forces.
The Joint Iraqi Operations Command had denied, yesterday, the extension of the date for the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq, which is set on the thirty-first of next December, while the spokesman for the Commander-in-Chief of the Iraqi Armed Forces, Major General Yahya Rasoul, confirmed earlier that the forces assigned to combat missions have begun to withdraw from Iraq and there is a continuous effort In order to complete the withdrawal process by the end of the year.
