Baghdad: Vice-President Joe Biden said yesterday his trip to Baghdad ahead of the US military pullout marks a new beginning between Iraq and the US but already protests in Iraq against his visit are demonstrating the difficulties the relationship will face.
Biden arrived Tuesday in a surprise visit to Iraq at a pivotal time as the last of the US troops withdraw, and the US must establish a new relationship with a country that is home to billions of barrels of oil and more closely aligned with neighbouring Iran than the US would like.
"In one month, our troops will have left Iraq and our strategic, close partnership, God willing, will continue; it will not continue in Iraq for Iraq but in this region," Biden said in a statement to reporters ahead of meetings with Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki.
New path
"Our troops are leaving Iraq, and we are working on a new path together, a new face of this partnership," he added. "This is marking a new beginning of the relationship that will not only benefit the United States of America and Iraq. I believe it will benefit the region and will benefit the world."
Sitting next to Biden, Al Maliki said the meetings yesterday were designed to lay the ground for future cooperation and partnership.
"We've passed a very difficult page of confronting Al Qaida and terrorism in Iraq during which we achieved joint success…We made many sacrifices from both sides," Al Maliki said.
"Iraq's and the United States of America's ambitions are to succeed in this relationship," he added.
Al Maliki also said the region is "sensitive" and that as changes occur, there should be cooperation between the US and Iraq.
One area in which Baghdad and Washington have been on different sides of the argument is Syria.
Cleric targeted
Two women were among five people killed in an attack on the home of a Muslim cleric in the Iraqi city of Samarra, police said yesterday, pointing the finger at loyalists of Al Qaida.
"Five people, two of them women, were killed around 10pm on Tuesday," a Samarra police commander said.
"Armed men attacked the home of Shaikh Khalid Al Naisani, killing him, his wife, their 17-year-old son and two other people who were at his house," the commander said.
