Baghdad, July 04: US Vice-President Joe Biden has said he is confident Iraqi politicians will resolve a political crisis that has left Iraq without a government.
He said after arriving in Baghdad that Iraq’s politics was “not a lot different” from other countries’.
Politicians were talking and he was “optimistic” they would form a coalition government soon, he said.
Mr Biden is due to meet Iraqi leaders, as well as US troops celebrating the 4 July holiday away from home.
Mr Biden’s visit comes four months after Iraq’s inconclusive election, in which no clear winner emerged.
“I think the country is in the position where, in one sense, it looks the most difficult putting the government together but, in another sense, this is local politics,” he told reporters.
“This is not a lot different than any other government.”
Withdrawal
Mr Biden’s aides said he would meet incumbent Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and the narrow winner of the election, Iraqiyya List leader Iyad Allawi.
He will also meet President Jalal Talabani.
On Saturday he met three other US lawmakers who are on a separate visit to the country: Republicans John McCain from Arizona and Lindsey Graham from South Carolina, and Joe Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut.
The US wants to take all of its combat troops out of Iraq by the end of next month.
Until now it has taken a hands-off approach to the formation of a new Iraqi government after the 7 March elections, the BBC’s Gabriel Gatehouse in Baghdad says.
Mr Biden’s visit is a sign they want to being a politicians to a quicker resolution.
But as the American presence dwindles, so does its influence, our correspondent says, and the White House may find that it has less leverage to bear than in the past.
——–Agencies