Reducing the US military presence in the Middle East region, particularly in Iraq, would be a step in the right direction, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova told at the briefing, commenting on the information that recently US President Donald Trump confirmed the plans of the US authorities to reduce the number of troops in Iraq.
"We believe that real actions by the US authorities to curtail their military presence in Iraq, as well as in the Middle East region as a whole, would be a step in the right direction. As time has shown, the presence of American units on Iraqi ground has not brought stability or peace there, " the diplomat said. "On the contrary, the security situation there remains very tense, as we have regularly discussed."
At the same time, Zakharova noted that "the policy of intentions publicly proclaimed by the Washington administration to withdraw its military units from foreign countries often remains empty declarations that are not implemented."
"If we talk about specific examples, this is certainly Syria, where American soldiers are firmly entrenched in violation of all international norms, although the same Donald Trump has repeatedly said that he is going to remove them from there. But this is not the only example, there are many such places on the world map," the diplomat concluded.
On Saturday, Trump confirmed US plans to reduce the number of troops in Iraq. To the post on his Twitter page, he attached a link to a material published on the website of the One America News Network (OANN) TV channel, in which, citing sources, it is claimed that the United States intends to reduce the number of its military personnel in Iraq from the current 5.2 thousand to 3.5 thousand. Trump's words at the same time repeat the title of the OANN publication.
Trump himself did not provide any explanations about the scale of the reduction in his message. It also did not specify whether it confirms all the data provided in the article on the OANN website.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Russian Foreign Ministry
Based on materials from TASS