In this task, you are given a text of many news articles seperated by special token "|||||". Your task is to summarize them.
Q: U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, right, meets with Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, March 24, 2013. Kerry made an unannounced visit to Iraq on Sunday and will urge al-Maliki... (Associated Press) 
  
 The U.S. has made clear that Iraq shouldn't allow Iran to use its airspace to ship weapons and fighters to Syria, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry told reporters Sunday during an unannounced trip to Baghdad. 
  
 Following private discussions with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Kerry said the two had a "very spirited discussion" on the subject of Iranian overflights. The U.S. believes the Iranian shipments are aiding Syrian President Bashar Assad and undermining Western-backed opposition groups. 
  
 "I made it very clear that for those of us who are engaged in an effort to see President Assad step down ... anything that supports President Assad is problematic," Kerry said. 
  
 Kerry also said that U.S. lawmakers and the American people are "increasingly watching what Iraq is doing and wondering how it is a partner." 
  
 In the absence of a complete ban on flights, the U.S. would at least like the planes to land and be inspected in Iraq to ensure that they are carrying humanitarian supplies. Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton secured a pledge from Iraq to inspect the flights last year, but since then only two aircraft have been checked by Iraqi authorities, according to U.S. officials. 
  
 The overflights have long been a source of contention between the U.S. and Iraq and Kerry will tell the Iraqis that allowing them to continue will make the situation in Syria worse and ultimately threaten Iraq's stability. 
  
 One senior U.S. official said the sheer number of overflights, which occur "close to daily," along with shipments trucked to Syria from Iran through Iraq, was inconsistent with claims they are only carrying humanitarian supplies. The official said it was in Iraq's interest to prevent the situation in Syria from deteriorating further, particularly as there are fears that al-Qaida-linked extremists may gain a foothold in the country as the Assad regime falters. 
  
 The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to publicly preview Kerry's meetings, said there are clear links between al-Qaida linked extremists operating in Syria and militants who are also carrying out terrorist attacks in Iraqi territory with increasing regularity. 
  
 A group of fighters in Syria known as Jabhat al-Nusra, a powerful offshoot of al-Qaida in Iraq that the U.S. has designated a terrorist organization, has claimed responsibility for most of the deadliest suicide bombings against regime and military facilities and, as a result, has gained popularity among some rebels. 
  
 Kerry will tell al-Maliki, a Shiite with close ties to Iran, that Iraq cannot be part of the political discussion about Syria's future until it clamps down on the Iranian shipments, the senior official said. 
  
 As Iraq approaches provincial elections next month, Kerry will also stress the importance of ensuring that all elements of society feel enfranchised, the official said. A recent decision to delay the polls in Anbar and Nineveh provinces is a "serious setback" to Iraq's democratic institutions and should be revisited, the official said. 
  
 In addition to al-Maliki, Kerry saw Iraqi parliament speaker parliament speaker Osama al-Nujaifi, a Sunni, whose faction is at odds with Maliki's Shiia. Kerry also spoke by phone with Massoud Barzani, the head of the Kurdish Regional Government based in Irbil to encourage the Kurds not go ahead with unilateral actions - especially involving oil, like a pipeline deal with Turkey. 
  
 He will stress the "importance of maintaining the unity of Iraq," say that "separate efforts undercut the unity of the country" and that "the Kurdish republic cannot survive financially without the support of Baghdad," the official said. 
  
 Kerry's arrival came just three days after the anniversary of the U.S.-led war that began on March 20, 2003, with an airstrike on Dora Farms in southern Baghdad in a failed attempt to kill Hussein. 
  
 The invasion and toppling of Hussein sparked years of bloodshed as Sunni and Shiite militants battled U.S. forces and each other, leaving nearly 4,500 U.S. soldiers and more than 100,000 Iraqis dead. 
  
 Violence has ebbed sharply since the peak of Sunni-Shiite fighting that pushed the country to the brink of civil war in 2006 and 2007. But insurgents are still able to stage high-profile attacks, and sectarian and ethnic rivalries remain threats to the country's long-term stability. 
  
 Earlier this week, an al-Qaida in Iraq front group claimed responsibility nearly 20 attacks that killed 65 people across the country on Tuesday and Wednesday. 
  
 The Islamic State of Iraq said it unleashed the car bombs and other explosions to avenge the executions and "massacres" of convicted Sunni inmates held in Iraqi prisons. Its claim came on the 10th anniversary of the start of the war, although it made no reference to the significance of the date. 
  
 Kerry arrived in Baghdad from Amman, where he had been accompanying President Barack Obama on his tour of Israel, the Palestinian Authority and Jordan. His visit to Iraq is the first by a U.S. secretary of state since Clinton went in April 2009. During Obama's first term, the Iraq portfolio was largely delegated to Vice President Joe Biden. 
  
 Since Clinton's trip, the American diplomatic presence in Iraq has shrunk dramatically, most significantly since U.S. ended military operations in late 2011, according to officials. A year ago, there were 16,000 State Department employees and contractors in the country. As of Kerry's visit, that number had declined to 10,500 and it will drop to 5,100 by the end of 2013, officials said. ||||| Iraq is helping to shore up the besieged regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad by allowing Iranian arms and fighters to cross into Syria from Iraq, Secretary of State John F. Kerry charged Sunday. 
  
 During an unannounced trip to Baghdad, Kerry lobbied Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki for greater scrutiny of flights that cross Iraq. He appeared to make little headway with Maliki, a Shiite with long-standing ties to Iran and little inclination to do U.S. bidding 10 years after the American invasion that toppled dictator Saddam Hussein. 
  
 Maliki is a prickly leader whose relations with U.S. officials have grown more strained since the departure of American forces and the re-emergence of widespread sectarian violence in Iraq. Maliki’s consolidation of power worries his U.S. backers. His dealings with Shiite Iran worry them more. 
  
 “Iraq’s success will take enormous cooperation,” Kerry said. “It’ll take dialogue, and it’ll take courage. It’ll require the resolve to defend the sovereignty of the country and its airspace. . . . 
  
 “We all want to see Iraq succeed. There’s such an enormous investment of our treasure, our people and our money in this initiative.” 
  
 1 of 56 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad × Decade: The U.S. intervention in Iraq -- and its toll View Photos It has been a decade since American forces entered Iraq. The long intervention produced these enduring images. Caption It has been a decade since American forces entered Iraq. The long intervention produced these enduring images. Buy Photo Wait 1 second to continue. 
  
 The Obama administration has been unable to persuade Iraq to block overflights from Iran or even to perform regular inspections. 
  
 “We had a very spirited discussion,” Kerry said after the meeting with Maliki, “and I made it very clear to the prime minister that the overflights from Iran are, in fact, helping to sustain President Assad and his regime.” 
  
 Kerry began the session with Maliki by joking that he had been assured that the Iraqi leader would “do everything that I say.” Maliki had a good-natured reply: “We won’t do it,” he said through an interpreter. Both men smiled. 
  
 Iraq says Iranian flights over its territory carry only humanitarian supplies for the civil war in next-door Syria, and the only two known inspections of Iranian aircraft found just those supplies. 
  
 The United States says the sheer volume of flights and overland vehicle traffic to Syria through Iraq points to regular arms shipments. A senior U.S. official traveling with Kerry said there are flights nearly every day. The official would not say how the United States is certain that the planes are carrying weapons for Assad, an Iranian ally, but repeatedly asserted that is the case. 
  
 “We know” the contents, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to preview Kerry’s argument to Maliki. 
  
 Iraq is not part of a U.S.- and European-led group of nations backing the Syrian rebels in their effort to oust Assad. The leader of the main U.S.-backed Syrian opposition group resigned Sunday amid infighting. Kerry said he was sorry, but not surprised, to see Mouaz al-Khatib leave. 
  
 “It’s almost inevitable, in the transition of a group such as the opposition, for these kinds of changes to take place as it evolves,” Kerry said. 
  
 Addressing the prospects for talks between Israel and the Palestinians after President Obama’s recent Middle East visit, Kerry was cautious. 
  
 “All of us have learned in the course of the last years, through many presidents and many secretaries of state, there has been no more intractable problem,” he said. “And so, expressing optimism when you don’t even have negotiations would be foolhardy. What I have is hope.” 
  
 In Iraq, Kerry also pressed Maliki to reconsider a decision to postpone local elections in two Sunni-majority provinces and to share power more equally with Sunnis and Kurds. The secretary also invoked Iraq’s first free election, in 2005, to urge Maliki to revisit the issue. 
  
 “No country knows more about voting under difficult circumstances than Iraq,” Kerry said at a news conference at the U.S. Embassy. 
  
 Iraq remains badly divided along sectarian lines, with near-daily killings and terrorist attacks attributed to sectarian rivalries. The Shiite-led cabinet last week postponed the elections, scheduled for April 20, for up to six months in Anbar and Nineveh provinces, citing threats to electoral workers. 
  
 “It would be disingenuous not to come here and say that there is a great deal of work yet to do. The United States is clear-eyed about the challenges that are still presented here in Iraq,” Kerry said. 
  
 Kerry’s visit comes at a low point for American influence. The Obama administration was unable to negotiate a long-term security agreement with the Maliki government, leading to the departure of all U.S. forces and most civilians by late 2011. 
  
 The mammoth U.S. Embassy in downtown Baghdad, the largest and most expensive in the world, is downsizing from more than 16,000 employees to about 5,000 this year. Only about 1,000 of those left will be diplomats. 
  
 The United States also is dismantling the vestiges of a police training program once envisioned as its signature contribution to postwar Iraq, in an acknowledgment of Iraqis’ lack of interest in a multibillion-dollar investment designed to bolster the country’s troubled judicial system. 
  
 Kerry’s trip is the first to Iraq by a U.S. secretary of state since Hillary Rodham Clinton traveled here in 2009, and it comes amid growing criticism from Iraqi officials, who say the United States has not done enough to build a strong postwar relationship with Baghdad. 
  
 American officials say that they are committed to building a stronger relationship with Iraq but that the country’s deadlocked politics, security concerns and endemic corruption have hindered U.S. investment. 
  
 Overall, Ambassador Stephen Beecroft said in a recent interview, the United States has made significant contributions to Iraq, the many missteps of the war notwithstanding. 
  
 “It’s a vastly different place,” Beecroft said, reflecting on the U.S. legacy in Iraq. “It basically took Iraq from a very limited society that had very limited options and opportunities for its people and opened those up to a democratic system that provides much more in the way of freedom and choices and opportunities.” 
  
 Many Iraqis have a dimmer view of the situation in their country, citing a stubborn insurgency, rising sectarian tension and a political crisis that has led Sunnis and Kurds to boycott Maliki’s Shiite-run government. 
  
 No Kurdish leaders came to Baghdad to meet Kerry. 
  
 Ernesto Londoño and Karen DeYoung contributed to this report. |||||
A: 
John Kerry dropped in unannounced on Iraq today, the first visit by an American secretary of state in four years, and he used the opportunity to continue prodding Nouri al-Maliki to slow the Iranian weapons that flow through his skies and into the hands of Syria's Bashar al-Assad. “We had a very spirited discussion,” Kerry said, “and I made it very clear to the prime minister that the overflights from Iran are in fact helping to sustain President Assad and his regime.” The US wants Iran's near-daily flights either banned or forced to land in Iraq for inspection, notes the Washington Post. Hillary Clinton last year exacted a promise from Baghdad to inspect the flights; only two have been inspected in the interim. Maliki has proven prickly on the subject, adds the AP, refusing inspections on the grounds that the planes carry humanitarian supplies. Kerry warned that America is eying the aid it sends Baghdad, and "increasingly watching what Iraq is doing and wondering how it is a partner."