The UN Security Council resolved unanimously on Friday, at Baghdad’s request, that the UN political mission in Iraq will withdraw after more than 20 years, at the end of 2025.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani demanded earlier this month that the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) be shut down in a letter to the council.
Al-Sudani said UNAMI had overcome “great and varied challenges” and that “the grounds for having a political mission in Iraq” no longer exist.
The UNSC resolution adopted on Friday extended the mission’s mandate for “a final 19-month period until 31 December 2025 after which UNAMI will cease all work and operations.”
Farhad Alaaldin, the Iraq prime minister’s advisor for foreign affairs, welcomed the move, expressing on X his “thanks to UNAMI for all their work during the past two decades.”
The mission was established by a UN Security Council resolution in 2003 at the request of the Iraqi government after the US-led invasion and fall of Saddam Hussein.
With over 700 employees, its main responsibilities include assisting with elections and security sector reform, as well as providing advice to the government on political dialogue and reconciliation.
Volker Perthes, a German diplomat, oversaw the secretary-general’s strategic assessment that was requested by the Council during the mission’s previous renewal in May 2023.
The closing plan, according to Perthes’ March assessment, would ensure skeptical Iraqis that the transition “will not lead to a reversal of democratic gains or threaten peace and security.”
