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Iraq

June 26, 2026

Baghdad 4:41 pm

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A worker at a market for fuel oil and automotive fuel on March 17, 2026, in Erbil, Iraq.

Explainer

After UAE and Qatar, could Iraq be next to leave OPEC?

Iraq is seeking a higher production quota as the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz has slashed oil revenues and plunged the country into a fiscal crisis.

Krikor Der-Hagopian at the 9th Sulaimani Forum, in Sulaimaniyah, Iraq, on April 16, 2025.

Iraq taps Krikor Der-Hagopian as first Armenian Christian ambassador to US

Baghdad’s pick of a US-educated Armenian Christian adviser as envoy to Washington underscores a bid to reset US-Iraq ties and broaden the country’s diplomatic profile.

Tom Barrack

Exclusive

Barrack heads to Iraq as US presses Baghdad on Iran-backed militias

US envoy Tom Barrack is due to meet with Iraq’s new prime minister and other top officials in Baghdad, where he will likely press US demands for Iran-backed Shiite militias be dismantled and disarmed.

Amberin Zaman

By Amberin Zaman

Reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

Latest News

Culture

World Cup opens amid visa disputes for Iran, Iraq and Somalia

Members of the Iranian national soccer team including midfielder Alireza Jahanbakhsh (R) arrive at Tijuana International Airport on June 7, 2026, in Tijuana, Mexico.

Syria says Iraqi oil shipments surge as Damascus courts foreign energy investment

A long convoys of Iraqi diesel-laden tanker trucks line up along the highway Tartus-Baniyas highway as they wait to unload their cargo at the Baniyas port refinery on the Mediterranean Sea, on April 15, 2026.

Israel-Iran escalation grounds flights across parts of Middle East

An Airbus A321 airliner arrives at the Mehrabad international airport during the delivery of the first batch of planes to the Iranian state airline Iran Air in the capital Tehran on Jaunary 12, 2017. - The aircraft arrived as part of an order for 100 other Airbus planes with a list price of around $20 billion (19 billion euros) on December 22, placed after the lifting of international sanctions on the Islamic republic. It will be used for internal flights landed at Tehran's Mehrabad airport. (Photo by ATTA

Amberin Zaman

Chief Correspondent

Reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

Jared Szuba

Defense and Security Correspondent

In Washington, DC, reporting on defense, national security, military

Beatrice Farhat

Associate Editor (Lebanon)

In Beirut, reporting on regional news, culture, conflict

Suadad al-Salhy

In Baghdad, reporting on politics and security

Lyse Mauvais

In Amman, reporting on humanitarian crises

Winthrop Rodgers

In Sulaymaniyah, reporting on Kurdish issues

Mourners carry the casket of one of eleven Iraqi soldiers, killed in an overnight attack by the Islamic State (IS) group against a base in eastern Iraq, through a street in the central holy shrine city of Najaf, on Jan. 21, 2022.

Islamic State escalates violence across Baghdad Belt

Terrorist attacks increase as Iraq continues government formation process.

Diyala funeral

Islamic State wipes out entire army outpost in Iraq’s Diyala

The latest major Islamic State attack in Iraq left 11 dead, including soldiers and their commanding officer, at an army outpost in a restive area northeast of Baghdad.

Members of the PKK are pictured during a peaceful protest against ongoing attacks against Yazidis in northern Iraq, on Aug. 16, 2014, in Hanover, Germany.

Iraqi army boots PKK-linked leader’s statue from Sinjar, arrests fighters

The Iraqi army has arrested several fighters from a PKK-linked Yazidi faction operating in Sinjar as part of an attempt to get them to abide by an accord signed in 2020 for greater stability and security.

Iraqi women ready to board a coach, part of a convoy, heading south of the Iraqi city of Karbala some 120 kilometers (74 miles) from the capital Baghdad, toward the Saudi Arabian city of Mecca, Nov. 22, 2008.

Iraq moves forward with building pilgrim route to Saudi Arabia

The Iraqi government is showing interest in completing the pilgrim route linking Iraq and Saudi Arabia, which will facilitate the arrival of religious visitor convoys between the two countries and will enhance trade and political relations.

DELIL SOULEIMAN/AFP via Getty Images

Islamic State stages Syria prison break, kills 11 soldiers in Iraq

The Islamic State attacked an Iraqi army barracks and a prison holding jihadists in Kurdish-run northeast Syria overnight.

Hasakah prison

Prison housing Iraqi, Syrian IS inmates attacked in Syria

Detention facilities under US-backed Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces were hit by a major attack attempting to free the thousands within.

Iraqis play at the snow-covered Safin Mountain on Jan. 18, 2022, near the city of Erbil, the capital of Iraq's northern Kurdish autonomous region.

Rare snowstorm hits Iraq and Syria

Many people in the Kurdistan Region rejoiced while playing in the snow, but such conditions can be dangerous for others, especially those living in displaced people camps.

DELIL SOULEIMAN/AFP via Getty Images

US diplomacy prompts Iraqi Kurds to allow aid through sealed Syrian border crossing

The Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq has agreed to open one crossing between its territory and northeast Syria twice a month for the passage of vital aid.

Iraq's Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi (R) visits the army headquarters in Tarmiya, 35 kilometers north of Baghdad, on Feb. 20, 2021.

Strikes on Baghdad Belt IS cells overshadowed by militia attacks

Recent airstrikes on areas close to the Iraqi capital as well as the killing of Islamic State fighters there have received scant attention as Iran-linked groups continue to carry out persistent attacks.

An aerial view shows Wadi al-Salam cemetery in the holy city of Najaf, as Muslims celebrate Eid al-Adha, Iraq, July 21, 2021.

'Valley of Peace,' largest world cemetery in holy city of Najaf

Wadi al-Salam is an ancient cemetery, the largest graveyard in the world, in Iraq's Shiite city of Najaf, where most Shiite Iraqis want to be buried.

Syrian families sit in a truck after being released from the Kurdish-run al-Hol camp, which holds relatives of suspected Islamic State fighters, Hasakah governorate, Syria, June 2, 2021.

SDF hands over 50 Iraqi IS suspects as prison concerns mount

The SDF has transferred another group of IS suspects with Iraqi nationality but arrested in Syria, alongside some of the thousands of Iraqis in al-Hol camp, to Iraq as the potential for jailbreaks remains high.

The new US Embassy complex, still under construction, is seen in the heavily fortified Green Zone, on the west bank of the Tigris River, Baghdad, Iraq, Oct. 11, 2007.

Rockets target US Embassy as Iraq struggles to form new government

An attack on US diplomatic offices in Baghdad widely assumed to have been by Iran-linked militias injured Iraqi civilians instead, as Kataib Hezbollah blamed foreign powers.