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Iraq

June 28, 2026

Baghdad 6:10 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

Sunni figures in exile return to Iraq as part of national reconciliation

Rafi Isawi has returned to Iraq to face trial for accusations related to terrorism; other Sunni figures with similar cases have expressed readiness to return to Iraq.

General Electric helps increase electricity generation in Iraq

Power stations that General Electric helped develop and improved exploitation of natural gas boost Iraq's energy infrastructure as the country seeks alternatives to imported energy from Iran.

Iraq summons Turkey, Iran as operations against Kurdish groups continue

Turkey cites past agreements for its operations against the Kurdistan Workers Party in Iraq, while Iran is also targeting Kurdish groups in the country.

Iraqi Yazidis take part in a religious ceremony at the Temple of Lalish, in a valley near the Kurdish city of Dohuk, about 430km northwest of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, on October 10, 2019. - Of the 550,000 Yazidis in Iraq before the Islamic State (IS) group invaded their region in 2014, around 100,000 have emigrated abroad and 360,000 remain internally displaced. (Photo by SAFIN HAMED / AFP) (Photo by SAFIN HAMED/AFP via Getty Images)

Yazidis still negotiating return of kidnapped women, children

In the absence of local and international authorities, the Yazidis continue buying back their kidnapped women and children.

Demonstrators gesture as they take part in the ongoing anti-government protests after newly-appointed Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi called for the release of all detained protesters, at Jumhuriya bridge in Baghdad, Iraq May 10, 2020. REUTERS/Khalid al-Mousily - RC2NLG9KIXGL

Iraqi protesters set sights on local governors

Protesters in Iraq are demanding that provincial governors be sacked and the killers of demonstrators be found and prosecuted.

Rockets hit Baghdad's Green Zone again

A series of such attacks is happening as the United States and Iraq discuss the future of the US military presence in the country.

UAE condemns Turkish and Iranian military interventions in Iraq

Turkey and Iran are conducting operations against Kurdish groups in the country.

United Arab Emirates

A member of Turkish police special forces stands guard in Azaz, Syria January 24, 2018. REUTERS/Osman Orsal - RC1CA41F7370

Turkey hammers Kurdish rebel targets in Iraq

Turkey has sent in special forces to fight the Kurdistan Workers Party in Iraq’s north, putting its soldiers on the ground in the third foreign country this year.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks the press at the State Department in Washington, DC, on May 20, 2020. (Photo by NICHOLAS KAMM / POOL / AFP) (Photo by NICHOLAS KAMM/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

Intel: Pompeo speaks with Iraq’s new foreign minister

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke with Iraq’s new Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein by phone on Tuesday.

Iraq's plans to cut salaries face strong backlash

The Iraqi government's decision to reduce government employees’ salaries has caused a major uproar among the political forces.

The flag of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) flies in front of its headquarters during a board of governors meeting in Vienna November 28, 2013. Iran has invited U.N. inspectors to visit a nuclear-related heavy water facility on December 8, their chief said on Thursday, a first concrete step under a plan to clarify concerns about Tehran's disputed nuclear programme. REUTERS/Heinz-Peter Bader (AUSTRIA - Tags: POLITICS ENERGY) - BM2E9BS0WUX01

Intel: European countries set to rebuke Iran at UN nuclear agency

Iran is facing a formal rebuke by the United Kingdom, France and Germany at the United Nation’s International Atomic Energy Agency for refusing to cooperate with the agency’s inspection of two sites believed to have housed nuclear research in the past.

A veiw of Baghdad international Airport, after Iraq has suspended flights at its domestic airports as the coronavirus spreads, in Baghdad, Iraq March 17, 2020. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani - RC2PLF9PTROE

Three Katyusha rockets land near Baghdad’s airport

The Iraqi military said no one was injured or killed in the attack near Baghdad's airport late Monday.