At least two protesters have been killed in Iraq’s capital Baghdad during renewed nightly demonstrations against corruption, unemployment and poor public services.
The deaths reported Monday by monitors and human rights officials were the first during anti-government protests since new Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi took office in May.
Simona Foltyn of Al Jazeera, reporting from Baghdad, said dozens of people were also injured on Sunday night after “plainclothes officials” opened fire using live ammunition against protesters gathered in Tahrir Square.
The plaza has been the epicenter of a protest movement that erupted in October last year, but had been extinguished in recent months due to the coronavirus pandemic.
“In the past few days, we have seen an increase in protests, not only in Baghdad but also in the southern provinces,” Foltyn said.
“People are motivated by a lack of services and electricity, just as the country is going through a great heat wave,” he added.
Iraqi protesters burn tires to block the road during a protest for poor public services in the holy city of Najaf [Alaa Al-Marjani/Reuters]
Protesters held rallies Sunday in the capital and in southern cities, where temperatures above 50 degrees Celsius (122 Fahrenheit) have overwhelmed electricity generators.
In Baghdad, dozens of protesters clashed with police and other security forces stationed in Tahrir Square.
Since taking office after months of political stalemate, al-Kadhimi had promised a dialogue with protesters and had requested exhaustive lists of all those who had been killed and wounded during the months-long protests in an attempt to achieve accountability. and compensation.
In an overnight statement, his office acknowledged “unfortunate events” in the protest squares, but insisted that the security forces had been instructed not to use violence unless absolutely necessary.
He said the government would carry out an investigation into Sunday’s events to hold those responsible accountable.
But online, activists were already comparing the new prime minister to his predecessor, Adel Abdul Mahdi, who resigned last year amid growing protests.
Some 550 people were killed in that wave of protests, and another 30,000 were injured, many of them by cans of military-grade tear gas that can pierce human skulls if shot directly, rather than launched into a bow, to disperse crowds.
An implosion in oil prices as a result of the coronavirus pandemic has also forced the government to impose austerity measures that have made life difficult for people, which could also lead to further protests.
To date, oil-rich Iraq has reported 110,032 confirmed cases of coronavirus and 4,362 related deaths.
SOURCE:
Al Jazeera and news agencies
.
