U.S.–Iraq Status of Forces Agreement

The U.S.–Iraq Status of Forces Agreement (official name: Agreement Between the United States of America and the Republic of Iraq On the Withdrawal of United States Forces from Iraq and the Organization of Their Activities during Their Temporary Presence in Iraq) was a status of forces agreement (SOFA) between Iraq and the United States, signed by President George W. Bush in 2008. It established that U.S. combat forces would withdraw from Iraqi cities by June 30, 2009, and all U.S. combat forces will be completely out of Iraq by December 31, 2011. The pact required criminal charges for holding prisoners over 24 hours, and required a warrant for searches of homes and buildings that were not related to combat. U.S. contractors working for U.S. forces would have been subject to Iraqi criminal law, while contractors working for the State Department and other U.S. agencies would retain their immunity. If U.S. forces committed still undecided "major premeditated felonies" while off-duty and off-base, they would have been subjected to an undecided procedures laid out by a joint U.S.-Iraq committee if the U.S. certified the forces were off-duty.

Framework agreement

A framework agreement is an agreement between two parties that recognizes that the parties have not come to a final agreement on all matters relevant to the relationship between them, but have come to agreement on enough matters to move forward with the relationship, with further details to be agreed to in the future. In international law, such an agreement between countries or groups can acknowledge that they can not reach full agreement on all issues, but are willing to memorialize a structure by which some disagreements can be resolved. In describing the effort to reach an agreement between Israel and Palestine, Senator George J. Mitchell explained:

Entering into a framework agreement can shift the lawmaking power from the states to a plenary body, and can shift the basis for forming consent to new norms and standards reached through their negotiations. The practice of entering into framework agreements originated in the 1950s, with an agreement regarding asylum between Colombia and Peru. A number of international accords are characterized as framework agreements: