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Donald Trump makes surprise visit to US troops in Iraq, defends Syria withdrawal

US President Donald Trump In His First Visit To Iraq On Wednesday Said That America Cannot Be The Policeman Of The World And Urged Countries To Share Responsibilities

News Nation Bureau | Edited By : Fayiq Wani | Updated on: 27 Dec 2018, 07:11:11 AM
Trump also defended his decision to pull American troops out of war-torn Syria (Photo: File)

New Delhi:

US President Donald Trump in his first visit to Iraq on Wednesday said that America cannot be the policeman of the world and urged countries to share responsibilities. Trump also defended his decision to pull American troops out of war-torn Syria. "The United States cannot continue to be the policeman of the world," Trump told reporters at a military base west of Baghdad, soon after he addressed American soldiers. Accompanied by First Lady Melania this was Donald Trump’s first visit to Iraq. Trump vowed for a "harsh response" from his administration if there was to be another terrorist attack on America.

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"If anything should happen at all, nobody will ever have suffered the consequences they had suffered," Trump told American troops at a military base west of Baghdad.

"It's not fair when the burden is all on us, the United States," he said, as he defended his decision to withdraw troops from Syria and let regional countries, Turkey, in particular, to complete the work of finishing the remnants of the ISIS terror group and Saudi Arabia to invest in development of the war-ravaged country.

In his interaction with reporters, Trump described how he gave "the generals" multiple six-month "extensions" to get out of Syria.

"They said again, recently, can we have more time? I said, 'Nope'. You can't have any more time. You've had enough time. We've knocked them out. We've knocked them silly.

"I will tell you that I've had some very good talks with (Turkish) President (Recep Tayyip) Erdogan who wants to knock them out also and he'll do it. And others will do it too. Because we are in their region. They should be sharing the burden of costs and they're not," the US President said.

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Last week, Trump surprised the world and his country as well when he suddenly announced that the US is pulling out its troops from Syria. "In Syria, Erdogan said he wants to knock out ISIS, whatever's left, the remnants of ISIS. And Saudi Arabia just came out and said they are going to pay for some economic development. Which is great, that means we don't have to pay. We are spread out all over the world. We are in countries most people haven't even heard about. Frankly, it's ridiculous," Trump added.

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First Published : 27 Dec 2018, 07:11:06 AM

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