Iraq considers any country sending ground combat forces into its territory a “hostile act” and has not requested such a deployment, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has said.
Iraq considers any country sending ground combat forces into its territory a “hostile act” and has not requested such a deployment, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has said.
The US has announced that it will deploy around 100 special forces personnel to Iraq to fight ISIS here and in neighbouring Syria, while two American senators have proposed tripling the number of US troops in the country.
Iraq “will consider any country sending ground combat forces a hostile act and will deal with it on this basis,” Mr Abadi said. Baghdad “did not request any side... To send ground forces to Iraq,” he said.
It is Mr Abadi’s strongest statement yet on the issue of ground combat forces, after he previously said that Iraq did not need them.
It was unclear how or if his remarks would impact the planned US deployment, part of efforts to combat ISIS, which overran large parts of Iraq in 2014.
The presence of American ground forces is a contentious issue in Iraq, where the United States fought a nearly nine-year war, and it is politically expedient for Mr Abadi to distance himself from the deployment. Spokesman for the US-led anti-ISIS coalition Colonel Steve Warren said Wednesday the new deployment had been discussed with Mr Abadi “for weeks”.
