BAGHDAD: Repeated US attacks on Iran-backed armed groups in Iraq are pushing the Baghdad government to end the US-led coalition’s mission in the country, the prime minister’s military spokesman said on Thursday.
The US military said one such strike on Wednesday killed the commander of Kataib Hezbollah, an Iran-backed armed group in Iraq that the Pentagon blames for attacking its troops.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani described the US attack as a “clear example of US state terrorism” and a violation of Iraq’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Yahya Rasool, the military spokesman for Iraqi Prime Minister Shia al-Sudani, said in a statement that the US-led coalition “has become a factor of instability and threatens to embroil Iraq in a cycle of conflict.”
Talks on the future of the coalition began in January, but less than 24 hours later three American soldiers were killed in an attack in Jordan that the United States said was carried out by Iran-backed militant groups in Syria and Iraq.
The talks have since been suspended, and Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein called for their resumption in a phone call with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday.
Any negotiations on the future of the coalition are expected to last months, if not longer, with an unclear outcome.
The US-led international military coalition in Iraq was formed to fight the Islamic State.
The United States has 2,500 troops in Iraq to advise and assist local forces to prevent the group from re-emerging.
Since the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza began in October, Iraq and Syria have witnessed near-daily tit-for-tat attacks between hard-line armed groups backed by Iran and US forces stationed in the region.
