US troops will not be removed from areas of Iraq that are not completely secure or where there is a high probability that attacks could resume after they leave, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said on Sunday.
In an interview, al-Maliki said he had told US President Barack Obama and other top US officials that any withdrawals “must be done with our approval” and in coordination with the Iraqi government.
“I do not want any withdrawals except in areas considered 100 percent secure and under control,” al-Maliki said during his flight from Australia to Baghdad at the end of a five-day visit.
“Any area where there is a likelihood of a resumption of attacks, withdrawals from there will be postponed,” he said.
The US-Iraq security pact that went into effect on Jan. 1 calls for US combat forces to leave the cities by the end of June in the first step of a plan to remove all US troops from Iraq by the end of 2011. Obama wants to withdraw all combat troops by September next year, leaving behind a residual force of up to 50,000 soldiers to train Iraqi forces and go after al-Qaeda.
Al-Maliki did not specify areas where the removal of US troops might be delayed. But those areas would likely include Mosul, the country’s third largest city, and Diyala Province northeast of Baghdad. Al-Qaeda and other Sunni extremist groups operate in both areas, despite repeated offensives by US and Iraqi forces.
Also Sunday, a senior US officer told reporters that US troops will focus on attacking insurgent supply routes and rural hideouts after combat troops withdraw from Baghdad at the end of June.
Brigadier General Frederick Rudesheim, a deputy commander of US forces in Baghdad, said the shift from the cities to large bases outside will help make the capital safer because US troops can go after militants at the source: the countryside where they plan their attacks and load up on guns and bombs.
Meanwhile, an opinion poll published yesterday shows that for the first time since the 2003 invasion, Iraqis were hopeful about the future and are increasingly preoccupied with conventional worries such as the economy and jobs. But it also showed that Iraqis remain unhappy about the role of foreign powers in their country, notably Iran, the US and Britain.
The survey was undertaken jointly by the BBC, ABC News and Japan’s NHK television last month. A total of 2,228 Iraqis were questioned across all 18 provinces. The margin of error is 2.5 per cent, the BBC said.
The survey is the sixth in a series of surveys since March 2004 and shows a marked overall improvement in perceptions, the BBC said. It showed striking shifts in opinion since the last poll, in March last year.
Malaysia yesterday installed a motorcycle-riding billionaire sultan as its new king in lavish ceremonies for a post seen as a ballast in times of political crises. The coronation ceremony for Malaysia’s King Sultan Ibrahim, 65, at the National Palace in Kuala Lumpur followed his oath-taking in January as the country’s 17th monarch. Malaysia is a constitutional monarchy, with a unique arrangement that sees the throne change hands every five years between the rulers of nine Malaysian states headed by centuries-old Islamic royalty. While chiefly ceremonial, the position of king has in the past few years played an increasingly important role. Royal intervention was
X-37B COMPARISON: China’s spaceplane is most likely testing technology, much like US’ vehicle, said Victoria Samson, an official at the Secure World Foundation China’s shadowy, uncrewed reusable spacecraft, which launches atop a rocket booster and lands at a secretive military airfield, is most likely testing technology, but could also be used for manipulating or retrieving satellites, experts said. The spacecraft, on its third mission, was last month observed releasing an object, moving several kilometers away and then maneuvering back to within a few hundred meters of it. “It’s obvious that it has a military application, including, for example, closely inspecting objects of the enemy or disabling them, but it also has non-military applications,” said Marco Langbroek, a lecturer in optical space situational awareness at Delft
The Philippine Air Force must ramp up pilot training if it is to buy 20 or more multirole fighter jets as it modernizes and expands joint operations with its navy, a commander said yesterday. A day earlier US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that the US “will do what is necessary” to see that the Philippines is able to resupply a ship on the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) that Manila uses to reinforce its claims to the atoll. Sullivan said the US would prefer that the Philippines conducts the resupplies of the small crew on the warship Sierra Madre,
AIRLINES RECOVERING: Two-thirds of the flights canceled on Saturday due to the faulty CrowdStrike update that hit 8.5 million devices worldwide occurred in the US As the world continues to recover from massive business and travel disruptions caused by a faulty software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, malicious actors are trying to exploit the situation for their own gain. Government cybersecurity agencies across the globe and CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz are warning businesses and individuals around the world about new phishing schemes that involve malicious actors posing as CrowdStrike employees or other tech specialists offering to assist those recovering from the outage. “We know that adversaries and bad actors will try to exploit events like this,” Kurtz said in a statement. “I encourage everyone to remain vigilant