Robert Gates, US Defence Secretary said on a visit to Iraq its security situation has improved "amazingly" in the past three years, according to the BBC.
His visit to the country aims to see how US troops are adapting to their new non-combat role since withdrawing from all urban areas at the end of June this year, and all American troops are due to leave Iraq by 2011.
Mr Gates, a top US envoy, was trying to revive the Arab-Israeli peace process when he was in Jerusalem earlier on, said the BBC.
Mr Gates met troops at a base in the south before travelling to the capital Baghdad, where he had talks with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki.
Other main issue raised during his visit, according to the AFP news, is to urge the Iraq's Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish communities to settle their political differences before the withdrawal of US troops by the end of 2011.
He was trying to persuade Iraqi Arab and Kurdish officials to take advantage of current US troops to resolve disputes over power-sharing, internal boundaries and oil revenues, a senior US defence official said, a senior US defence official said in AFP news.
The BBC's Gabriel Gatehouse reports from Baghdad that today’s Iraq is a very different place, but Gabriel declined it is a peaceful one, he says attacks still daily plague many towns and cities.
Gabriel then went on to say US forces continue to patrol in some urban areas, but the Pentagon - headquarters of the United States Department of Defense - would prefer its troops to focus on training and supporting Iraqi forces.
Regarding the disputes between the three local communities, as the AFP news continues, the Obama administration has called for stepped up bids to tackle the quarrels that threaten to revive ethnic and sectarian strife.
The administration believes that "all sides have to take an approach in both words and actions that commits them to a peaceful political process," one official said.
According to the AFP news, the Kurds particularly have an interest in forging reconciliation promptly while US forces remain on the ground.
On the other side, the official said Washington has longstanding ties to the Kurdish former rebel factions which run an autonomous regional government in northern Iraq, so former Kurdish faction could act as an "honest broker" between the Kurds and the Shiite-led central government, the AFP has leant.
Gabriel’s trip to Kurdistan comes after presidential and parliamentary elections in the region on Saturday, which regarded as a new reform-minded opposition group to hail a major breakthrough against the long-dominant ex-rebel factions.
Back to the US troops withdrawal issue, the BBC reports US-led combat operations are due to end by September 2010 with the complete troop withdrawal by the end of the 2011.
However, at a new conference after his talks with the Iraqi prime minister, Mr Gates recommends better leave the matter on whether some US troops could stay on beyond a 2011 deadline for withdrawal until end of 2010 or even 2011.
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