Iraq–Syria relations
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Iraq–Syria relations are the bilateral/diplomatic relations between the sovereign states of Iraq and Syria. Both countries/nations are neighbours and they share the Iraq–Syria border. Relations are marked by long-shared cultural and political links, as well as former regional rivalry. The two countries took their present form after the Sykes–Picot Agreement to dismember the Ottoman Empire into British and French spheres of influence after World War I.[1]
Iraq and Syria are united by historical, social, political, cultural and economic relations. The land known as Mesopotamia is Iraq and eastern Syria and is called such by its inhabitants. Both countries are largely Arab and Muslim, with Kurdish, Assyrians Chaldeans Syriacs, Arab Christians and Syrian Turkmen and Iraqi Turkmen minorities. Political relations between them have often been hostile. Ever since King Faisal took the Iraqi throne in the early 1920s, Iraqi leaders have dreamed of unifying the two countries. Relations were mostly poor during the Ba'athist regimes of Hafez al-Assad and Saddam Hussein, though Hafez's son Bashar al-Assad significantly improved relations. New diplomatic relations established in November 2006, were heralded as the beginning of an era of close cooperation between Iraq and Syria.[2]
Both countries fought against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). In the Syrian Civil War, Iraqi volunteers have been fighting in Syria alongside the Syrian Army.[3] The two countries are part of the Russia–Syria–Iran–Iraq coalition which was formed as a consequence of an agreement reached at the end of September 2015 between Russia, Iran, Iraq and Syria to "help and cooperate in collecting information about ISIL to combat the advances of the group, according to the statement issued by the Iraqi Joint Operations Command.[4][5][6] From 2017 to 2019, Iraq joined the Syrian Civil War on behalf of the Syrian government and helped eliminate the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant within the country.[7][8]