WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden plans to host Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani, who is visiting next month as the countries hold formal talks about winding down the mission of a US-led military coalition formed to fight the Daesh group in Iraq.
The meeting is scheduled for April 15, the White House said Friday.
The leaders will “consult on a range of issues,” including the fight against Daesh and “ongoing Iraqi financial reforms to promote economic development and progress toward Iraq’s financial independence and modernization,” the White House said.
The two countries have a delicate relationship due in part to Iran’s considerable sway in Iraq, where a coalition of Iran-backed groups brought Al-Sudani to power in October 2022.
The US in recent months has urged Iraq to do more to prevent attacks on US bases in Iraq and Syria that have further roiled the Middle East in the aftermath of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. It’s also sought to apply financial pressure over Baghdad’s relationship with Tehran, restricting Iraq’s access to its own dollars in an effort to stamp out money laundering said to benefit Iran and Syria.
The US and Iraq, meanwhile, held a first session in January to discuss ending the coalition created to help the Iraqi government fight Daesh, with some 2,000 US troops remaining in the country under an agreement with Baghdad. Iraqi officials have periodically called for a withdrawal of those forces.
The visit will also come a year after the kidnapping in Baghdad of Elizabeth Tsurkov, a Russian-American academic at Princeton University who is believed to be held by an Iran-backed militia, Kataib Hezbollah, that is regarded by Washington as a terrorist group and is seen as one of the most powerful armed groups in Iraq. It was formed during the power vacuum that followed the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, with support from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
On Thursday, Tsurkov’s sister, Emma, urged the State Department to declare Iraq a state sponsor of terrorism and called on the White House to make the Al-Sudani meeting contingent on the prime minister arranging for the release of her sister — something she said that he was empowered to do.
“I am appalled that Sudani will be allowed to shake President Biden’s hand while his other hand holds the keys to my sister’s shackles,” Tsurkov said at event outside the Iraqi Embassy in Washington.
Biden to host Iraqi leader with talks underway on winding down coalition against Daesh
https://arab.news/25qk8
Biden to host Iraqi leader with talks underway on winding down coalition against Daesh
- The leaders will “consult on a range of issues,” including the fight against Daesh
- The two countries have a delicate relationship due in part to Iran’s considerable sway in Iraq
Trial opens in Tunisia of NGO workers accused of aiding migrants
- Aid workers accused of assisting irregular migration to Tunisia went on trial on Monday, as Amnesty International criticized what it called “the relentless criminalization of civil society”
TUNIS: Aid workers accused of assisting irregular migration to Tunisia went on trial on Monday, as Amnesty International criticized what it called “the relentless criminalization of civil society” in the country.
Six staff members of the Tunisian branch of the France Terre d’Asile aid group, along with 17 municipal workers from the eastern city of Sousse, face charges of sheltering migrants and facilitating their “illegal entry and residence.”
If convicted, they face up to 10 years in prison.
Migration is a sensitive issue in Tunisia, a key transit point for tens of thousands of people seeking to reach Europe each year.
A former head of Terre d’Asile Tunisie, Sherifa Riahi, is among the accused and has been detained for more than 19 months, according to her lawyer Abdellah Ben Meftah.
He told AFP that the accused had carried out their work as part of a project approved by the state and in “direct coordination” with the government.
Amnesty denounced what it described as a “bogus criminal trial” and called on Tunisian authorities to drop the charges.
“They are being prosecuted simply for their legitimate work providing vital assistance and protection to refugees, asylum seekers and migrants in precarious situations,” Sara Hashash, Amnesty’s deputy MENA chief, said in the statement.
The defendants were arrested in May 2024 along with about a dozen humanitarian workers, including anti-racism pioneer Saadia Mosbah, whose trial is set to start later this month.
In February 2023, President Kais Saied said “hordes of illegal migrants,” many from sub-Saharan Africa, posed a demographic threat to the Arab-majority country.
His speech triggered a series of racially motivated attacks as thousands of sub-Saharan African migrants in Tunisia were pushed out of their homes and jobs.
Thousands were repatriated or attempted to cross the Mediterranean, while others were expelled to the desert borders with Algeria and Libya, where at least a hundred died that summer.
This came as the European Union boosted efforts to curb arrivals on its southern shores, including a 255-million-euro ($290-million) deal with Tunis.
