U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry (L) is pictured alongside U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday urged Iraqi prime minister-designate Haidar al-Abadi to quickly form an inclusive government, while ruling out sending U.S. combat troops to the country, Agence France-Presse reported.

“We are urging him to form a new cabinet as swiftly as possible and the US stands ready to support a new and inclusive Iraqi government and particularly its fight against ISIS,” he said.

“There will be no reintroduction of American combat forces into Iraq. This is a fight that Iraqis need to join on behalf of Iraq,” he added.

Kerry’s comments in Sydney follow a statement from President Barack Obama that Iraq had taken “a promising step forward” in designating Haider al-Abadi as its new prime minister.

The Secretary of State also said that the United States and Australia agreed to take concerns about the threat posed by militant foreign fighters in Syria, Iraq and elsewhere to the United Nations.

“We intend to join together in order to bring this to the United Nations meeting this month and put it on the agenda in a way that will elicit support from the source countries as well as those countries of concern,” Kerry said after joint security talks.

The issue of foreigners traveling to conflicts to join militants from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria was discussed between U.S. and Australian officials in Sydney, spurred by images of a Sydney-raised boy holding the severed head of soldier in Syria.

Kerry said Australia and the U.S. had agreed to “work together to assemble a compendium of the best practices in the world together regarding those foreign fighters”.

 
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