Foreign troops in Iraq cut by a quarter in 2018: PM

Foreign troop numbers in Iraq fell by a quarter during 2018, Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi said, as the fallout fizzled from Washington's announcement it was withdrawing from neighbouring Syria.

"In January 2018 there had been almost 11,000 foreign fighters, about 70 percent of them are American, the others are from other countries," Abdel Mahdi told a weekly press briefing on Tuesday evening.

"In December, the numbers have been reduced to almost 8,000, and the American troops are around 6,000... maybe I am wrong by some hundreds." Abdel Mahdi said that more than 12 months after the government declared victory over the Islamic State group in Iraq, the drawdown was accelerating.

"In recent months, the decrease has sped up and in the last two months there was a drop of 1,000 forces," he said.

US President Donald Trump has said that US troops will remain in Iraq after the withdrawal of all troops from Syria and will be available to take action against IS on the other side of the border