Iraqi PM's Security Adviser: Baghdad Proposes Joint Security Coordination Council to Iran and Saudi Arabia

Qasim al-Araji, national security adviser to Iraq's prime minister, said on Sunday, Shahrivar 1, 1405 (August 23, 2026), on the television program Al-Mashhad, that Iraq has proposed forming a unified security coordination council to Iran and Saudi Arabia. According to Donya-e-Eqtesad, citing ISNA, he described a crisis of trust as the core problem between Tehran and Riyadh. Al-Araji also said September 30 marks the deadline for the international coalition's withdrawal from Iraq and the start of the government and political forces' own program, and he called the state's monopoly on weapons a purely Iraqi decision with no foreign interference.