Zaidi meets Trump for the second time as weapons deadline shifts

NEW YORK — Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi met President Donald Trump in New York to discuss political, economic and investment cooperation and regional developments, his office said, ten weeks after telling him at the White House that armed factions would have no justification after Sept. 30.

“The two sides discussed bilateral relations and ways to strengthen cooperation and partnership between the two countries in the political, economic and investment fields,” the prime minister’s office said. The two also reviewed regional developments and joint efforts to strengthen regional and international security. The statement did not mention the weapons file.

That date has since moved. Zaidi told The New York Times this week that armed groups would observe a 90-day halt in attacks from Sept. 30 before handing over weapons, with the process ending by June 30, 2027, and U.S. envoy Tom Barrack said Washington and Baghdad had agreed that by the end of June “only the state is the keeper of the military force.” The prime minister’s security adviser Qasim al-Araji said last week there was “no specified period,” and a senior Coordination Framework figure said on Wednesday that some factions still want two years to hand over their weapons.

The meeting came during a week in which Iraqi airports stopped receiving Iranian flights as U.S. sanctions on Iran’s aviation sector took hold, with officials giving conflicting accounts of who ordered it, and eight days before the U.S.-led coalition mission in Iraq ends.

Forty-eight agreements and memorandums with U.S. firms in oil, electricity, industry, technology and finance were announced during the July visit. The government has not published the texts or said how many are binding contracts.