Iraqi army fully takes over key base following US withdrawal

BAGHDAD — U.S. forces have fully withdrawn from an air base in western Iraq in implementation of an agreement with the Iraqi government, Iraqi officials said Saturday.

Washington and Baghdad agreed in 2024 to wind down a U.S.-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group in Iraq by September 2025, with U.S. forces departing bases where they had been stationed.

However, a small unit of U.S. military advisers and support personnel remained. Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani in October told journalists that the agreement originally stipulated a full pullout of U.S. forces from the Ain al-Asad air base in western Iraq by September. But ''developments in Syria'' since then required maintaining a ''small unit'' of between 250 and 350 advisers and security personnel at the base.

Now all U.S. personnel have departed.

Iraqi Army Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Abdul Amir Rashid Yarallah oversaw the assignment of tasks and duties to various military units at the base on Saturday following the withdrawal of U.S. forces and the Iraqi Army's full assumption of control over the base, the military said in a statement.

The statement added that Yarallah ''instructed relevant authorities to intensify efforts, enhance joint work, and coordinate between all units stationed at the base, while making full use of its capabilities and strategic location.''

A Ministry of Defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment publicly confirmed that all U.S. forces had departed the base and had also removed all American equipment from it.

U.S. forces have retained a presence in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq and in neighboring Syria.

The departure of U.S. forces may strengthen the hand of the government in discussions around disarmament of non-state armed groups in the country, some of which have used the presence of U.S. troops as justification for keeping their own weapons.