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Iraq’s President, Barham Salih, will visit Syria and meet with his counterpart, Bashar al-Assad, in the upcoming few days, an unnamed Iraqi official told the Russian news agency Sputnik on December 18.
“The president of Iraq will pay an official visit to Damascus in the coming days,” Sputnik quoted the official as saying.
Commenting on the matter, Luqman al-Fiali, a spokesman for the Iraqi Presidency, said on December 19 that arrangements for an official visit to Syria are yet to be prepared. Al-Fiali added that Iraqi is communicating with all of its neighbors.
Salih was elected as the president by the Iraqi Parliament in October. Prior to that, the Iraqi Kurdish politician served as prime minister of Iraqi Kurdistan between 2009 and 2012.
Last week, Sudan’s President, Omar al-Bashir, became the first Arab leader to visit Syria and met with Assad since the outbreak of the Syrian war in late 2011. Local observers believe that the Iraqi President will follow al-Bashir’s footsteps, even if not in the upcoming few days.
