Baghdad Federal Government

Pentagon chief Ashton Carter met Iraqi Kurdish president Massud Barzani Friday on the second day of a trip to Iraq aimed at reviewing efforts to defeat the Islamic State group.

A federal judge signaled on Wednesday he may order the US government to release as many as 2,000 photographs depicting the alleged harsh treatment of detainees in US custody at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and other sites.

President Barack Obama said on Saturday US air strikes had destroyed arms that Islamic State militants could have used against Iraqi Kurds, but he warned there was no quick fix to a crisis that threatens to tear Iraq apart.

Iraq's Kurds would face enormous challenges if they were to secede, but the threat of an independence vote amid chaos nationwide could squeeze concessions from the federal government, experts say.

A suicide bomb blast in central Baghdad on Sunday killed at least nine people and injured 20, police and medical sources said.

Ask younger Iraqi Kurds if they speak Arabic, and they often say no, or not well -- a linguistic barrier with the country's Arabs stemming from a nationalist backlash against Saddam Hussein's brutality.

Scores of gunmen took over a federal police headquarters in northern Iraq on Friday before driving a tanker laden with explosives into the building, killing many, a government official said.

FIFA on Wednesday barred Iraq from hosting international football friendlies due to a massive surge in nationwide violence, barely three months after world football's governing body gave Baghdad the go-ahead.

Pentagon chief Ashton Carter met Iraqi Kurdish president Massud Barzani Friday on the second day of a trip to Iraq aimed at reviewing efforts to defeat the Islamic State group.

A federal judge signaled on Wednesday he may order the US government to release as many as 2,000 photographs depicting the alleged harsh treatment of detainees in US custody at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and other sites.

President Barack Obama said on Saturday US air strikes had destroyed arms that Islamic State militants could have used against Iraqi Kurds, but he warned there was no quick fix to a crisis that threatens to tear Iraq apart.

Iraq's Kurds would face enormous challenges if they were to secede, but the threat of an independence vote amid chaos nationwide could squeeze concessions from the federal government, experts say.

A suicide bomb blast in central Baghdad on Sunday killed at least nine people and injured 20, police and medical sources said.

Ask younger Iraqi Kurds if they speak Arabic, and they often say no, or not well -- a linguistic barrier with the country's Arabs stemming from a nationalist backlash against Saddam Hussein's brutality.

Scores of gunmen took over a federal police headquarters in northern Iraq on Friday before driving a tanker laden with explosives into the building, killing many, a government official said.

FIFA on Wednesday barred Iraq from hosting international football friendlies due to a massive surge in nationwide violence, barely three months after world football's governing body gave Baghdad the go-ahead.