BAGHDAD, Iraq –– Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi has said his country no longer requires US combat troops to fight the Islamic State group (ISIS), but a formal timeframe for withdrawal will depend on the outcome of talks with Washington this coming week.
Kadhimi said in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press on Friday that Iraq will still ask for US training and military intelligence gathering.
He spoke ahead of a planned trip to Washington where he is due to meet US President Joe Biden on Monday.
"We do not need any foreign combat forces on Iraqi soil," said Kadhimi, falling short of announcing a deadline for their departure.
But he insisted any withdrawal schedule would be based on the needs of Iraqi forces, who he said had shown themselves capable over the past year of conducting independent anti-ISIS missions.
"The war against Daesh (ISIS) and the readiness of our forces require a special timetable (for withdrawal), this will depend on the negotiations that we will conduct in Washington," he said.
The US and Iraq agreed last April that the US transition to a train-and-advise mission meant the US combat role would end, but they hadn't settled on a timetable for completing that transition.
In Monday's meeting at the White House, the two leaders are expected to specify a timeline, possibly by the end of this year.
It's unclear, however, whether that would result in any US troop withdrawals.
The US troop presence has stood at about 2,500 since late last year when President Donald Trump ordered a reduction from 3,000.
The current US mission of training and advising Iraqi forces has its most recent origins in President Barack Obama's decision in 2014 to send troops back to Iraq in response to an ISIS takeover of large portions of western and northern Iraq and a collapse of Iraqi security forces that appeared to threaten Baghdad.
Obama had fully withdrawn US forces in 2011 after invading in 2003.
"What we want from the American presence in Iraq is to support our forces in training, developing their efficiency and capabilities and in security cooperation," al-Kadhimi said.
"Iraq is not like Afghanistan," he said, referring to concerns that the Taliban will take over Afghanistan once the US completes its pullout there.
The trip to Washington comes as the Iraqi government has faced one setback after another, seriously undermining the public's confidence in it.
Ongoing missile attacks by militia groups have underscored the limits of the state and a series of devastating hospital fires amid soaring coronavirus cases have left dozens dead.
Meanwhile, early federal elections, in line with a promise Kadhimi made when he assumed office, are less than three months away.
Kadhimi has promised to hold early elections, now scheduled for October, and to bring to account the killers of activists, including that of prominent commentator Hisham al-Hashimi who was killed outside his home last summer.
Activists, whose cries for elections once resonated in the squares of the capital, now say they will boycott the October polls.
Many are distrustful that the political establishment, which approved electoral reforms, could ever produce free and fair elections.
But Kadhimi called on all political groups to take part in the vote.
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