Kurdish writer says US envoy Barrack and PM al-Zaydi cannot end Iran's influence in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Kurdish writer Samir Adil argued in an article that U.S. President Donald Trump's appointment of Tom Barrack as a special presidential envoy will not end Iran's influence in Iraq. He wrote that Iran-backed militias have penetrated all state institutions and that the slogan of a state monopoly on arms has no practical meaning. Adil said new Prime Minister Ali al-Zaydi, nominated by the Coordination Framework, lacks the capacity to control the militias and was chosen as a weak figure in the same mold as predecessors Kazimi, Abdul-Mahdi and Sudani. He claimed that commanders of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Quds Force move freely on Iraqi territory, that airports and ports have been struck, and that Iraq's judiciary and government have offered only hollow statements. The writer described the Strait of Hormuz, the Gulf states and Iraq as three strategic leverage points for Iran, arguing that as long as war and peace remain uncertain, expecting success from Barrack's mission or al-Zaydi's government would be an illusion. He cited the Badr Organization as an example, saying the integration of some militias into the security forces remains formal and that groups which appear to have left the Popular Mobilization Forces structure continue to operate in practice.