Obama urges compromise in surprise visit to Iraq

US President Barack Obama made an unannounced visit to Baghdad yesterday, marking a new chapter in his strategy to wind down the unpopular war in Iraq and shift the United States' military focus to Afghanistan. Pushing Iraq's feuding factions to compromise, he sounding a note of impatience as he said Iraqis should take responsibility for their country so US troops could leave.

Mr Obama flew to Baghdad to meet US military commanders and Iraqi leaders and assess security there first-hand after announcing a strategy to wind down the unpopular six-year war by withdrawing all US combat troops by the end of August 2010 and the rest of US troops by the end of 2011.

"It is time for us to transition to the Iraqis. They need to take responsibility for their country... in order to do that they need to make political accommodations," Mr Obama told some 1,500 troops at a base outside Baghdad.

His visit to Baghdad was shrouded in the security-conscious secrecy that marked similar trips by his predecessor George W. Bush, whose foreign policy legacy was defined by the unpopular war that he launched in 2003 to topple Saddam Hussein.

In a meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, President Obama acknowledged there had been political reforms but said more work was needed. He told reporters it was "absolutely critical for all Iraqis to be adequately integrated into the government and security forces, adding he wanted to work with Mr Maliki in a "spirit of partnership".

Iraq experts fear that if steps are not taken to resolve disputes between Sunni and Shi'ite Arab and Kurdish political blocs, recent security gains, partly won by a US troop build-up in the last two years, could unravel, plunging Iraq back into violence.

Mr Obama's visit was not publicised beforehand and was made known only after Air Force One, flying from Istanbul at the end of Mr Obama's first major international tour, had touched down at Baghdad International Airport.

His arrival came a day after a string of seemingly coordinated bombings across the Iraqi capital killed 37 people. Yesterday, a car bomb killed nine people and wounded 20 in the Shi'ite Kadhimiya district of northwest Baghdad, police said.