Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki

President Barack Obama meets with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki (NOO'-ree ahl-MAHL'-ih-kee) in the Oval Office on Tuesday morning. Afterward, Obama holds a ceremony to honor recipients of a Presidential Unit Citation for actions in Vietnam. Eighty-six Army veterans of Troop A, First Squadron, 11th Armored Combat Regiment will be at the White House to receive the citation. In the afternoon, the president travels to New York, where he'll tour the headquarters of the city's Joint Terrorism Task Force. In the evening, Obama will attend two Democratic fundraisers. One is for Bill Owens, who's running for New York's 23rd Congressional District. The other benefits ... Read Full Story

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has met the radical Shiite group believed to have kidnapped five Britons two years ago after it said it had renounced violence, a government spokesman said on Sunday. "The government welcomes the statement by the League of the Righteous that it renounces violence and supports the political process and efforts to achieve national unity," Ali al-Dabbagh said on official Al-Iraqiya television. "We reached an agreement to resolve all problems, especially those regarding detainees who do not have Iraqi blood on their hands and against whom there is no evidence of having committed crimes," he said, adding that the meeting ... Read Full Story

The top U.S. commander in Iraq said Sunday a decision on withdrawing American forces from Iraq's major cities by a June 30 deadline will be made by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki with U.S. military advice. Gen. Raymond Odierno did not specifically say whether U.S. troops would leave Iraqi cities by the deadline, which is part of a plan for the gradual drawdown of American forces. Odierno contends that overall violence in Iraq remains at the low levels seen in the early months after the U.S. invasion in 2003. But he noted "there are still some elements" in Iraq able to conduct serious attacks on ... Read Full Story

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki met with Russia's leaders on Friday to discuss Russia's push for a bigger role in Iraq's oil and gas industry. During his first visit to Moscow as Iraq's leader, Nouri al-Maliki met with President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin said before his arrival Thursday that a key issue is "the expansion of Russian companies' participation in major projects in the oil and gas industry, electric power" and other sectors. Al-Maliki told Medvedev in the Kremlin that Iraq is interested in Russian investment, and Putin said at an earlier joint news conference that talks focussed on ... Read Full Story

On Farewell Visit to Iraq, Bush Is Paid the Supreme Insult When An Angry Iraqi Journalist Tosses His Shoes At Him During Press Conference With PM Al-Maliki -- A Dramatic Show That the Most Unpopular President in Modern U.S. History Is Even More Bitterly Disliked Abroad In this dramatic image captured on video, President Bush ducks to avoid getting hit in the head by a shoe that was tossed at him by an angry Iraqi journalist during a news conference in Baghdad Sunday with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki (right) in Baghdad. The journalist, in a bitter protest against the continued presence of U.S. ... Read Full Story