Baghdad, Iraq (CNN) -- Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki proclaimed Iraq as "sovereign and independent" during a national address Tuesday to mark the official end of the U.S. combat mission in his country.
Al-Maliki praised the strides made by Iraqi security forces in fighting terrorism, attributing their efforts to making the U.S. drawdown possible. The combat mission formally ends at 5 p.m. ET.
"If these security achievements were not real, we would not have been able to move to executing the bigger and more important step, which is the withdrawal of American forces that is happening today," he said. "This withdrawal would not have happened without the sacrifices of all the Iraqi people and the heroics of the army, police and security forces and the tribesmen who supported them.
"We do not view the withdrawal as an accomplishment of one person, or one party or one sect or one ethnicity; it is an achievement for all Iraqis. ... And it represents a golden opportunity to strengthen national unity and a starting point to build Iraq after decades of destruction and suffering," he said. CNN
