US Congressman: Congress is ready to support Iraq in exchange for abandoning militias and respecting Kurdistan’s security.
US Congressman: Congress is ready to support Iraq in exchange for abandoning militias and respecting Kurdistan’s security.
2025-12-10
Shafaq News – Erbil / Washington
On Wednesday, Republican US Representative Joe Wilson expressed Congress’s readiness – for the first time – to add new provisions to the US National Defense Authorization Act that would support Iraq in exchange for abandoning support for Iranian-backed militias, while also calling on Baghdad not to encourage parties to target the Kurdistan Region.
In a lengthy post on the “X-formerly Twitter” platform, Wilson said, “I appreciate the leadership of President Trump and his special envoy to Iraq, Mark Savaya, who announced his desire to rebuild Iraq and made it clear to Iraq that continued support for Iranian-backed militias will not be accepted,” adding, “It is time to liberate Iraq from Iran.”
Last October, US President Donald Trump decided to appoint Mark Savaya as special envoy to Iraq, the third US envoy to Iraq since Paul Bremer in 2003, and after Brett McGurk, during the war against ISIS in 2014.
Savaya, an American businessman of Iraqi (Chaldean/Assyrian) descent from Michigan, rose to prominence in recent years through his support for Trump’s presidential campaign and his outreach to Middle Eastern communities in the United States. His lack of prior diplomatic experience made his appointment surprising in political circles, but Trump affirmed that he possesses “a deep understanding of Iraq and influential contacts in the region.”
Wilson added in his post that “Iraq has an opportunity to prosper if it changes its behavior,” noting that Congress is prepared to support President Trump with new provisions in the National Defense Authorization Act, which would require Iraq – for the first time ever – to provide assistance to Iraqi security forces by taking real steps to stop supporting Iranian-backed militias.
Wilson also said that “the National Defense Authorization Act still includes provisions that I have sponsored for years, prohibiting the diversion of American taxpayer funds to the Badr Corps and any Iranian-backed militias.”
The US congressman asserted that “Iraq is under complete Iranian control, which manages its army and security forces, which include a number of designated terrorist organizations such as Kataib Hezbollah, Asaib Ahl al-Haq, and Kataib al-Imam Ali, and its judiciary through corrupt judges like Faiq Zaidan, who always rules with Iran, and its police force, which is completely controlled by the Badr Organization, and its political system (which is dominated by the Coordination Framework and other militias supported by Iran),” as he described it.
He pointed out that “with these facts, it is clear that it does not matter who wins the elections or forms a government, as the entire country is deeply infiltrated by Iran, even though the majority of Iraqis from all sects want a free and independent state free from malicious Iranian influence.”
Iraq held its sixth parliamentary elections last November, in which the coordinating framework that includes the ruling Shiite political forces and parties in Iraq managed to achieve the highest number of votes, similar to the other elections that the country witnessed after 2003, and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein’s regime by the forces of the United States of America and its allies.
Wilson stressed that “Congress will not continue to issue blank checks forever, and Iraq must seize the opportunity, under the leadership of President Trump and Special Envoy Savaya, to change its behavior before it is too late.”
At the end of November, Savaya stated that Iraq was at a crossroads, between restricting weapons or returning to a “spiral of complexity,” adding in a post on X that “no economy can grow, nor can any international partnership succeed, in an environment where politics is intertwined with informal power. Iraq now has a historic opportunity to close this chapter and strengthen its image as a state based on the rule of law, not the power of weapons.”
The US congressman noted in his post that “it is time to stop funding Iranian entities (such as the Popular Mobilization Forces and other Iranian-backed militias, including those designated as terrorist) through the Iraqi federal budget, the Central Bank, or the Ministry of Oil.”
“All money laundering and financial transfers to Iran and its clients must be stopped. An international audit of all oil and fuel product sales, both domestically and internationally, must be conducted, as well as an audit of all oil-related institutions, including the Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Oil, the Ministry of Industry, and their affiliated institutions. Real action must be taken to permanently disarm all Iranian-backed militias,” Wilson said.
At the beginning of October 2025, the US Treasury Department imposed a package of sanctions targeting Iraqi banking figures and companies linked to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and Kataib Hezbollah, including “Al-Muhandis Company,” the economic arm of the Popular Mobilization Forces, in a move it said was aimed at “dismantling corruption and money laundering networks that enable armed groups to operate inside and outside Iraq.”
The US congressman went on to say that “the Iraqi government, judiciary, army and police should make sovereign decisions on behalf of their people instead of submitting to the dictates of Iran, its proxy militias and thieves.”
He stressed that “Iraq should continue to respect the security of the Kurdistan Regional Government and stop allowing or encouraging Iranian-backed groups to attack the regional government.”
The Kurdistan Region is subjected to continuous attacks, both with missiles and suicide drones, targeting its economic infrastructure. The latest attack, the 11th targeting the Kor Mor gas field, occurred at the end of November. The field supplies gas to power plants in the Kurdistan Region, as well as to some neighboring federal provinces.
Wilson concluded his post by saying, “President Trump seeks to build a future of peace and prosperity, based on trade, not conflict, for the peoples of the Middle East, and Iraq can be a shining example of this, thanks to its strong economic and diplomatic ties with the United States, the Gulf, Syria, Turkey, and other countries,” stressing that “this cannot be achieved if Iraq continues to play the role of a puppet in the hands of Iran.”
shafaq.com
