Pompeo meets with Iraqi leaders

Secretary of state makes unannounced trip to Baghdad on Middle East tour

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made an unannounced visit to Iraq on Wednesday, meeting with the Iraqi prime minister, Kurdish officials and other leaders in a bid to demonstrate the United States’ support for a key ally.

Pompeo’s visit is part of a Middle East tour in which the secretary is seeking to reassure U.S. partners in the region following President Donald Trump’s abrupt decision to withdraw troops from Syria. Pompeo is promising allies that the troops’ departure will not alter the U.S. mission to push back against Iran and oversee the complete defeat of the Islamic State, a prospect many in the region are now questioning.

His stop in Baghdad came amid speculation among Iraqi officials that the White House also will begin to draw down the 5,200 American forces based in Iraq in view of the military defeat of the Islamic State in late 2017.

Pompeo said he discussed Trump’s decision on Syria with the Iraqi leaders but that the focus of the meetings was on strengthening Iraq’s government to prevent an Islamic State resurgence and to beat back Iran’s significant influence in the country.

There was “a common understanding that the battle against Daesh, to counter Daesh, and the fight to counter Iran, is real and important,” he said, after leaving Baghdad and arriving in Irbil, the capital of the Iraqi Kurdish region.

Daesh is an Arabic term for the Islamic State.

U.S. officials have scrambled to contain the fallout from Trump’s sudden directive for U.S. troops to leave Syria. Pompeo’s tour began in Jordan on Tuesday and will continue in Egypt, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Oman.

A key aspect of the U.S. withdrawal, protecting the U.S.-aligned Kurds from Turkish forces, appeared in jeopardy this week when Turkey lashed out at national security adviser John Bolton after his visit to the region.

Pompeo told reporters Wednesday that progress was being made in addressing Turkey’s objections to Kurdish militants in northeastern Syria and that Ankara had made “commitments” that the Kurds who fought with U.S. forces against the Islamic State will be protected.