Pentagon chief in Iraq says US troops will remain in country

The US Secretary of Defence, Lloyd Austin, assured Tuesday in Baghdad that his troops will remain in the country at the request of the Iraqi government, despite the fact that the Iraqi Parliament has called for their withdrawal, in a surprise trip he is making a few days before the 20th anniversary of the US invasion of the Arab country. 

"US troops will remain here at the request of the Iraqi government, but these troops will provide support and advice," the Pentagon chief told a news conference in Baghdad. 

Austin, the highest-ranking official in Joe Biden's administration to visit Iraq, thanked Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani and Defence Minister Thabet al-Abasi for "their commitment to ensuring that coalition forces here in Iraq remain at the request of the Iraqi government". 

The aim of this trip to Iraq, which is part of a Middle East tour that began two days ago in Jordan, is to reaffirm the strategic partnership between the two countries to make Iraq a "more secure, stable and sovereign" nation. 

"We will continue to work with our Iraqi partners for a better life for the Iraqi people, and I am very optimistic about this Iraqi-US relationship(...)the US will continue to expand that partnership to support Iraq's security, stability and sovereignty," he said. 

The mission they are focused on is to "wipe out" the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group and that is the only objective, he said. 

The US leads an anti-jihadist coalition that was created to defeat IS, which proclaimed a "caliphate" in the summer of 2014 and rapidly expanded and even reached the gates of Baghdad. 

Although the jihadist organisation was territorially defeated in 2017, its remnants still continue to carry out attacks, mostly against Iraqi security forces and particularly along the Syrian border and in the north and centre of the country. 

The Islamic State is estimated to have between 5,000 and 7,000 members and sympathisers spread across Iraq and Syria, about half of whom are fighters, according to recent UN data. 

Austin's trip comes less than two weeks before the 20th anniversary of the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, which toppled the regime of former dictator Saddam Hussein and sent the country into a spiral of instability. 

Austin was the last US force commander to oversee the military's withdrawal in 2011. 

The assassination of powerful Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani in a targeted US bombing in Baghdad in January 2020 led to the end of the US combat mission in Iraq and the withdrawal of a large military contingent, although the Americans retain around 2,000 troops dedicated exclusively to advising and training. 

Austin is also making this tour of the region to address the escalating violence between Israel and Palestine, as well as the threats associated with Iran in the region. 

He is expected to travel to Israel and Egypt, although the US department has not provided dates.