Macron meets Iraqi Parliament Speaker al-Halbousi

French president Emmanuel Macron met with the speaker of the Iraqi parliament, Mohamed al-Halbousi, in Baghdad on Saturday evening.

Macron is in Iraq to attend the Baghdad Conference for Peace and Partnership which France co-organised with Iraq.

The French leader described Saturday’s summit meeting as “historic,” showcasing Iraq’s return to stability following the ruinous war against the Islamic State group, which was defeated in 2017.

After decades of conflict, Iraq is seeking to reclaim a leadership role and status in the Arab world with a centrist policy and a determination among the country’s top leaders to maintain good relations with both Iran and the United States and its regional allies.

The Shiite-majority country lies on the fault line between Shiite Iran and the mostly Sunni Arab world, led by powerhouse Saudi Arabia, and has long been a theater in which Saudi-Iran rivalry for regional supremacy played out.