(29 Apr 2016) US Vice President Joe Biden pressed Iraq on Thursday not to let its crippling political crisis upend hard-fought gains against the Islamic State (IS) group as he returned to the country that's come to symbolise America's relentless struggles in the Middle East.
Biden met Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi and Parliament Speaker Salim al-Jabouri, a Sunni politician facing calls from his colleagues to resign, in Baghdad on Thursday.
Biden's roughly eight-hour visit came amid a wave of tense protests and demands for sweeping political reforms that have paralysed a government already struggling to tackle a dire economic crisis and battle IS.
Biden also stopped briefly in Irbil, the capital of Iraq's mostly autonomous northern Kurdish region, where he met with Kurdish President Massoud Barzani.
Kurdish Peshmerga forces have been among the most effective forces battling IS extremists, but the US partnership with Kurdish forces in neighbouring Syria has been a sore point with US NATO ally Turkey.
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