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Iraq

June 28, 2026

Baghdad 3:22 am

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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

Ex-Ninevah governor arrested as Iraqi government reins in corruption

The arrest and forced removal of Iraqi government officials signals attempts to curb rampant corruption that has plagued the country.

Sunni agreement to expel Popular Mobilization Units from liberated Iraqi cities

Sunni political parties are using murders in Salahuddin province to demand an end to the presence of armed militias blamed for killings.

A member of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) carries an automatic rifle on a road in the Qandil Mountains, the PKK headquarters in northern Iraq, on June 22, 2018. - Hundreds of Iraqi Kurds marched Friday to protest Turkish strikes against the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) after Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara would press an operation against its bases. (Photo by SAFIN HAMED / AFP) (Photo credit should read SAFIN HAMED/AFP via Getty Images)

Yazidis react to Sinjar accord amid growing KRG-PKK tensions in Iraq

A security agreement reached earlier this month between the Iraqi central government and the Kurdistan Region on the disputed territory of Sinjar has sparked both praise and criticism as tensions rise between the KRG and the PKK.

Sunni Muslim men pray over the bodies of eight out of 12 fellow Iraqis, who were reportedly kidnapped on October 17 and later some of them found shot dead, during their burial ceremony in the Farhatiya area of the Balad region, located 70 kilometres (around 45 miles) north of Baghdad in the Salaheddin province, on October 18, 2020. - Local sources said the four other kidnapped men have not been found and the identity of the assailants remains unknown in the mysterious crime. (Photo by - / AFP) (Photo by -/A

Iraqi Sunni politicians organize a new political front

Dozens of Iraqi Sunni lawmakers have met to discuss forming a new alliance after eight youths were killed with alleged involvement by Shiite-led factions in Salahuddin province.

UK to return 5,000 ancient artifacts to Iraq

Included in the repatriation is a 4,000-year-old Sumerian relic discovered in an online auction.

Iran desperate to maintain Iraqi financial lifeline

Iran seeks to maintain the flow of hard currency from Iraq to help it overcome the US sanctions.

UN project hopes to preserve Iraq’s marshlands

A new UN-funded cultural project has been launched in the Ahwar of Southern Iraq to save the inhabitants of the marshlands from poverty.

Iraq invites international bidders to Mansuriya gas field

As Baghdad feels added strain from OPEC+ production cuts and continuing economic woes, the country invites international energy companies to compete for oil and gas development.

Iraq's Kadhimi kicks off European tour in Paris

Iraq’s Prime Minister Mustafa al-Khadimi is also slated to visit Germany and the United Kingdom as he looks to deepen economic and security cooperation.

Killing of Sunni youths prompts calls for end to impunity in Iraq

The killing of at least eight Sunni youths from a village in Iraq’s Salahuddin province, allegedly by groups other than the Islamic State, has sparked outcry and demands for non-local forces to be expelled from the region.

Supporters of Hashed al-Shaabi, an Iraqi paramilitary network dominated by Iran-backed factions, wave the Hashed flag as they stand under the national flag during a protest denouncing comments made by Kurdish ex-minister and to show their support to the paramilitary network in the southern Iraqi city of Basra on October 17, 2020. - Hashed supporters burned down the main Kurdish party's headquarters in Baghdad after criticism from a Iraq's Former Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari. Hundreds of Hashed demonstrat

Iraqi militias defy government, expand networks and pressure

Militias in Iraq are increasing their activities in response to the government's efforts to rein them in.

Iraqi cleric pushes for elections, new social contract, in support of prime minister

Iraqi cleric Ammar al-Hakim, the head of Iraqioun parliamentary bloc and Hikma movement, is seeking to chart a nonsectarian alternative to the existing political structure.