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Iraq

April 5, 2025

Baghdad 12:24 am

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A picture taken on Oct. 17, 2017, shows excess flammable gasses burning from gas flares at the Havana oil field, west of the multiethnic northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk.

Exclusive

Iraq seeks more compensation from Turkey, 'blocks' reopening of Kurds' oil pipeline

Disputes over oil revenues and arbitration claims have kept the Kurdish pipeline closed.

Amberin Zaman

By Amberin Zaman

In Paris, reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

AFP via Getty Images

One Turkish soldier, 17 PKK militants killed in northern Iraq clashes

The killing of the Turkish soldier comes ahead of militant leader Abdullah Ocalan’s expected call to disarm the Kurdistan Workers Party.

Ocalan

Iraqi Kurds lend hand as PKK leader negotiates plan for peace with Turkey

Abdullah Ocalan is expected to urge his men to lay down their arms and end a more than 40-year insurgency against the Turkish state, capping talks launched in April last year between the rebel leader, PKK commanders and the Turkish government.

Turkey's Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan (L) speaks during a joint press conference with Iraq's Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein (R), Baghdad, Iraq, Aug. 22, 2023.

Turkey, Jordan, Iraq to hold first anti-ISIS summit this month: Turkish official

Top diplomats as well as Turkish, Jordanian, Syrian and Iraqi defense and intelligence chiefs aim to hold a first security summit this month as part of efforts to set up a regional anti-ISIS coalition, Al-Monitor has learned.

Latest News

Iraq passes law that could legalize child marriage: What to know

Iraqi Muslim girls, who traditionally begin wearing the hijaba head covering worn in publicat the mandatory age of nine, take part in a ceremony organized at a stadium in Basra on December 19, 2024. (Photo by Hussein FALEH / AFP) (Photo by HUSSEIN FALEH/AFP via Getty Images)

Kurdish leader Barzani, SDF's Kobane meet to seek common ground in Syria

DELIL SOULEIMAN/AFP via Getty Images

Exclusive

Iraqi Kurdish leader Barzani to meet Syria SDF commander Kobane in historic step

Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) commander-in-chief Mazloum Kobane waves after giving a press conference in Syria's northeastern city of Hasakeh on Dec. 6, 2024.

Amberin Zaman

By Amberin Zaman

In Paris, reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

Khamenei pushes for US withdrawal from Iraq in meeting with Sudani

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani (R) and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian in Tehran on Jan. 8, 2024.

Amberin Zaman

Chief Correspondent

In Paris, reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

Jared Szuba

Pentagon Correspondent

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

Beatrice Farhat

Associate Editor (Lebanon)

In Beirut, reporting on regional news, culture, conflict

Andrew Parasiliti

President and Chief Content Officer

In Washington, DC, reporting on diplomacy, regional politics, national security

Suadad al-Salhy

In Baghdad, reporting on politics and security

Lyse Mauvais

In Amman, reporting on humanitarian crises

URS FLUEELER/AFP via Getty Images

Saudi FM makes unannounced visit to Iraq, meets Sudani: What we know

Saudi Arabia and Gulf states are showing increasing interest in Iran-dominated Iraq.

Iraqi security forces monitor the area during a demonstration to demand the withdrawal of the Turkish troops from the Bashiqa camp, located in the Mosul province, on Oct. 8, 2016, outside the Turkish Embassy in Baghdad.

Analysis

Turkey’s security pact with Iraq: Which side came out on top?

The most contested presence for Baghdad is the military base established by Turkish forces in 2015 near the Iraqi town of Bashiqa.

Amberin Zaman

By Amberin Zaman

In Paris, reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

PKK tunnel

Exclusive

From mountaintops to underground: PKK responds to Turkey’s drones

Serdar Yektas, spokesperson for the Kurdistan Workers Party's armed wing, told Al-Monitor that Turkey’s use of its home-manufactured drones has drastically changed the nature of the conflict between them.

Amberin Zaman

By Amberin Zaman

In Paris, reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

A soldier rides on a Turkish armored vehicle near the Habur crossing gate between Turkey and Iraq during a military drill on September 18, 2017.

Iraq, Turkey set to end standoff over military base with new pact

The deal, hailed by both sides as historic, includes an agreement to turn a Turkish military base in the Iraqi town of Bashiqa over to the Iraqi government.

Passengers look at the flight board at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv on Aug. 6, 2024.

Travelers scramble as airlines cut flights amid fear of Iran-Israel war

Germany's Lufthansa extended a suspension of services to Tel Aviv, Tehran, Beirut, Amman and Erbil to Aug. 13.

This picture taken on April 25, 2023, shows a shrapnel-pocked walled in the village of Hiror near the Turkish border in northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region.

Turkey says PKK attack kills Turkish soldier in northern Iraq

The attack comes at a time when Turkey has intensified its offensive against the militant group in an effort to clear the PKK from the Iraq-Turkey border areas and establish up to a 40-kilometer-deep (24 miles) security zone in northern Iraq.

A woman walks holding a placard as activists demonstrate against female child marriages, in Tahrir Square in central Baghdad on July 28, 2024, amid parliamentary discussion over a proposed amendment to the Iraqi Personal Status Law. (Photo by AHMAD AL-RUBAYE / AFP) (Photo by AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AFP via Getty Images)

Iraqis protest proposed 'anti-women' amendment to personal status law

Temporarily prevented from being read in parliament, an amendment to the country’s personal status law is seen as the “latest salvo” in a lengthy battle.

Shanaz Ibrahim Ahmed (L), the wife of Iraqi President Abdul Latif Rashid, comforts a Kurdish woman during a ceremony marking the Anfal mass killings, after corpses were transferred from Baghdad to the Kurdish town of Chamchamal for burial, on February 21, 2024.

Ankara brushes off Iraqi first lady’s accusations labeling Turkey as 'invader'

In an unusual effrontery, the first lady accused Turkey of displacing hundreds and destroying large swaths of agricultural areas.

Women worshippers stand at the altar, they pray and tie knots in pieces of cloth that represent their wishes, during their visit to the new Yazidi Temple in the village of Aknalich, 35 kilometres from the Armenian capital Yerevan, on October 11, 2019.

Yazidis or Kurds? The fight over identity in Armenia and Iraq

A growing number of Yazidis insist they are not ethnic Kurds, part of an effort to construct a distinct identity in order to survive.

A US Army armored vehicle flies an American flag as it provides security escort for a convoy of vehicles pulling equipment that is heading to Kuwait from Camp Adder as the Army continues to send it's soldiers and equipment home and the base is prepared to be handed back to the Iraqi government later this month on December 2, 2011, at Camp Adder, near Nasiriyah, Iraq.

US resumes talks with Iraq over future of troop presence

Negotiations between the Biden administration and a senior Iraqi delegation resumed in Washington on Monday as Baghdad has sought to establish an end-of-mission timeline for the 2,500 US troops that remain in their country.

Members of Yemen's security forces stand guard as as Shiite Muslims listen to a speech by Houthi leader Abdul-Malik al-Huthi broadcast on a giant screen during a ceremony commemorating Ashura, July 16, 2024.

Analysis

Is Houthi expansion in Iraq a genuine threat or smoke screen?

Iraq's relations with Saudi Arabia are called into question as the Houthis seek to expand their influence in the region.

Francesco Schiavi

By Francesco Schiavi

In Bologna, reporting on security, defense, economy, governance

Iraq's new first lady and Iraqi-Kurdish politician and writer Shanaz Ibrahim Ahmed receives a bouquet of flowers during her husband's inauguration and handover ceremony as the new Iraqi president at al-Salam Palace in the capital Baghdad on Oct. 17, 2022.

Iraq’s first lady blasts Turkey’s assault against PKK in Kurdistan Region

The first lady's own family history and the upcoming parliamentary elections are likely behind her decision to speak up now.