WASHINGTON — When Senator Obama arrives in Baghdad this week, he will have a chance to hear directly from Prime Minister al-Maliki whether the Iraqi leader supports the 16-month withdrawal timeline that Mr. Obama has embraced on the campaign trail.

Mr. Maliki landed in the center of the American presidential campaign during the weekend when a German magazine, Der Spiegel, printed an interview that quoted him as endorsing in principle Mr. Obama’s timetable. A spokesman for Mr. Maliki yesterday issued a statement saying the prime minister had been misquoted but did not specify which part of the interview contained the error; the magazine said on its Web site that the interview was accurate.

Asked whether Mr. Obama would seek clarification from Mr. Maliki when the two meet this week, a spokeswoman for the Obama campaign, Wendy Morigi, said: “Senator Obama looks forward to a conversation with Prime Minister Maliki, but as Senator Obama has said, he is going to be listening on this trip. There is one president at a time in the United States.”

On Saturday, however, a senior foreign policy adviser to Mr. Obama, Susan Rice, said the Illinois senator welcomed the statement from Mr. Maliki. “This presents an important opportunity to transition to Iraqi responsibility, while restoring our military and increasing our commitment to finish the fight in Afghanistan,” she said in a statement.

The Iraqi prime minister’s remarks on a withdrawal time line for American troops appear to undercut a key argument from Senator McCain and other Republicans, who say it is irresponsible to establish such a timetable without considering the conditions on the ground.

But Mr. Maliki’s latest position could present a problem for the Obama campaign, as well. The senator’s plan to withdraw all American combat troops from Iraq within 16 months of taking office has never before been tied to negotiations with the Iraqi government. Should Mr. Maliki revise or refine his remarks to Der Spiegel, the Obama campaign would be faced with an uncomfortable choice: give up its preferred withdrawal plan or tell Iraq’s government that as president Mr. Obama would disregard its positions when formulating his Iraq policy.

The presumptive Democratic nominee has said in the past that he planned to work with the Iraqi government and American commanders to establish troop levels in Iraq. On this score, he may run into some resistance to his 16-month withdrawal plan.

Over the weekend, General David Petraeus, whom the Senate recently confirmed as chief of the military theater that includes both Iraq and Afghanistan, Central Command, told NBC News that a 16-month time line for withdrawal should hinge on conditions in Iraq. “It depends on the conditions, depends on the missions set, depends on the enemy. The enemy does get a vote and is sometimes an independent variable. Lots of different factors, I think, would be tied up in that,” he said.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen, said yesterday on “Fox News Sunday” that setting a deadline for the withdrawal of troops independent of conditions on the ground was “very dangerous.”

An author and adviser to the McCain campaign, Max Boot, said he did not think Mr. Maliki would endorse a 16-month timetable that was not tied to conditions in Iraq. “The unanimous view of Iraqi officers and American officers” is that “while the Iraqi security forces are improving, they are not ready to take over responsibility for policing their country on their own,” he said. “I think Prime Minister Maliki basically knows that. I don’t think he or the government of Iraq will impose a rigid timetable for withdrawal of the kind Senator Obama advocates.”

On his trip to the Middle East this week, Mr. Obama is being urged to tell the governments of Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority that he would condition key portions of their financial aid on their human rights record.

“Senator Obama should signal to all parties in the region that, to avoid complicity, the US government will cut aid that is funding continuing breaches of international human rights law,” the executive director of Human Rights Watch, Kenneth Roth, said in a letter.

Asked about the letter, Ms. Morigi said: “Human rights will continue to be an important part of this trip, as they have been for Senator Obama throughout this campaign.”