Iraqi PM on Trump’s travel ban: Our conduct will not be hard like his, MP
BAGHDAD — Iraqi Prime Minister has said that Iraq’s response to the US ban against its citizens will be soft, that Iraq’s “conduct will not be hard like [Trump]", and that it does not intend to turn all Americans into its enemies because of one order from US President Donald Trump, an Iraqi MP told Rudaw.
“Concerning the travel ban of Iraqis to the United States, [Haider] al-Abadi said, ‘We will act in a soft manner in regard with [Donald] Trump’s stance, and our conduct will not be hard like him,’” Renas Jano, an Iraqi MP, who is also a member of parliament’s foreign affairs committee, told Rudaw on Sunday evening.
Jano said Abadi made the remarks on Sunday in a meeting at the Rafidayn Center in Baghdad.
Abadi’s office was not immediately available to comment.
Trump signed an executive order which bans citizens of Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Syria, Sudan, Libya and Yemen from traveling to the US for 90 days.
Abadi also said in the meeting that they are trying to reach out to people friendly with Iraq within the United States, unclear if he meant within the Trump administration, the US congress or outside the government.
“In the United States, we will take advantage of those parties whose conduct is soft,” Abadi said. “We will not act in such a way to turn all Americans into our enemy just because of one order from Trump.”
Meanwhile, Iraq’s foreign ministry is said to have established a crisis room to consider the country’s options with this regard, AFP reported, citing a source who declined to be named.
AFP also reported that the foreign affairs committee has called on the Iraqi government to respond in kind.
Jano confirmed to Rudaw English that a committee meeting was supposed to take place, but it didn’t because of a lack of a quorum; however, it may have taken place after he left parliament, he said.
“Even if the committee had made such a call, it is not legally binding,” Jano said, adding that it would have been binding only if the Iraqi parliament passed it through voting in the general assembly, not a committee alone.
Earlier in the day, The powerful Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi has called on the Iraqi government to expel all Americans from Iraq and stop those who plan to visit. The Shiiete cleric Muqtada al-Sadr also made similar demands.