Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has spoken by phone with his Iraqi counterpart Ibrahim al-Jaafari to discuss the “unlawful incursion” of Turkish troops in northern Iraq, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Saturday.
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Abadi claimed that Iraq has already given “Turkey a time limit to withdraw its troops and not to close the door to dialogue”, and called upon the Security Council to “shoulder its responsibilities” by demanding that Turkey withdraw.
Turkey’s military presence in northern Iraq could be re-evaluated depending on conditions in the field, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Friday, APA reports quoting Anadolu Agency.
A row over the deployment has soured relations between Ankara and Baghdad, which denies having agreed to it. Ankara says the troops were sent as part of an worldwide mission to train and equip Iraqi forces to fight the Islamic State group. “We have no such luxury”, Erdoğan said.
Several thousand protesters, majority members of Shia paramilitary forces, gathered in central Baghdad on Saturday to demand the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Iraq.
“This is considered a flagrant violation of the principles of the U.N. Charter, and a violation of Iraqi territorial integrity and sovereignty of the state of Iraq”, the letter continues.
Power told reporters following a council meeting on Burundi that any troop deployments in Iraq need to be done with the consent of the Iraqi government.
He went on to say that Russian Federation and Iran were behind the Iraqi complaints.
Turkey insists the forces were deployed to protect trainers working with Iraqi forces at the site, but Baghdad has repeatedly demanded their withdrawal and complained to the UN Security Council.
Erdoğan defended Turkey’s move to send more troops, saying Isis and other terror groups were “running wild” and Baghdad was unable to protect Turkish soldiers there.
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According to president Erdogan, troops at the Bashiqa camp are in Iraq to provide training to local fighters and the Kurdish peshmerga.
