Washington – Hillary Clinton Warns Iran Not to Meddle in Iraq

Washington – Iran should not misread the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq as affecting the U.S. commitment to the fledgling democracy, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Sunday.

President Obama’s announcement Friday that all American troops would return from Iraq by the end of the year will close a chapter on U.S.-Iraq relations that began in 2003 with the U.S.-led invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein. Iran is expected to try to use the departure of U.S. troops to expand its influence on its neighbor.

Washington has long worried that meddling by Iran, a Shiite Muslim theocracy, could inflame tensions between Iraq’s Shiite-led government and its minority Sunnis, setting off a chain reaction of violence.

Clinton said in a series of news show interviews that the United States would continue its training mission with Iraq and that it would resemble operations in Colombia and elsewhere. While the United States will not have combat troops in Iraq, she said the American presence would remain strong because of its bases in the region.

“Iran would be badly miscalculating if they did not look at the entire region and all of our presence in many countries in the region, both in bases, in training, with NATO allies, like Turkey,” she told CNN’s “State of the Union.”

The timeline for U.S. troop withdrawals had been agreed to by President George W. Bush and Iraqi leaders. For months the Obama administration negotiated with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other Iraqi officials to extend the stay of troops and to build permanent bases. Both sides saw advantages to keeping several thousand U.S. troops in Iraq as part of a training mission, but there was also strong opposition in both the United States and Iraq.

A sticking point was the U.S. demand that American troops be granted legal immunity to shield them from Iraqi prosecution, a flash point for Iraqi anger over the Americans’ special status in their homeland.

Arizona Sen. John McCain, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, called the withdrawal decision “a serious mistake” that is viewed in the region as a victory for Iran. He also said the presence of U.S. bases elsewhere in the region will have little impact on Iraq.

“There was never really serious negotiations between the administration and the Iraqis,” McCain told “This Week” on ABC. “I believe we could have negotiated an agreement. And I’m very, very concerned about increased Iranian influence in Iraq.”