Baghdad Aug 31, : Iraqi prominent Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has asked his followers to cease their protests and to leave the Green Zone in Baghdad, after violence killed 22 people and injured around 200 others.In a press conference broadcast on television on Tuesday in the Shia holy city of Najaf located in the southern part of Baghdad, the capital of Baghdad, al-Sadr apologized to the Iraqi people who were affected from the violence insisting the fact that he wanted peaceful protests “not bombs or bullets”.
He asked his supporters to “withdraw in 60 minutes,” including from the sit-in in the front of the parliament or he “will not recognize them”.
After his speech immediately following his speech, immediately following his speech, the Iraqi Joint Operations Command said in an announcement that “it was agreed to relax the curfew in Baghdad and the provinces,” as quoted by Xinhua news agency.
Security sources of the Interior Ministry told Xinhua that after his speech Sadr’s supporters began to withdraw from the Green Zone, which houses the government’s main offices and a few foreign embassies.Armed militiamen began disappearing slowly from the capital’s streets.
Four rockets were fired at the fortified Green Zone overnight after al-Sadr announced his resignation from politics on Monday, triggering the protests of his backers in where up to 22 people were killed and more than 200 were wounded the Iraqi military said on Tuesday.
The nightly clashes broke out among Saraya al-Salam, or Peace Companies which are committed to al-Sadr and militiamen who are believed to be linked with al-Sadr’s adversaries from different Shia parties.
On Monday, supporters of al-Sadr have occupied a few of the government’s main headquarters in the Green Zone following their leader’s announcement that he quit political life in protest over the corruption of political parties in the country.
The political tensions in Iraq have risen in the last few weeks between al-Sadr’s opponents in the Coordination Framework (CF), an umbrella group of Shia political parties in parliament.
On the 30th of July al-Sadr’s supporters entered the Green Zone and held an open sit-in in and around the Parliament building calling for the dissolution of the parliament and calling for an election before the end of July, which is opposed by the CF parties.
The CF was the largest coalition in the Iraqi parliament following al-Sadr directed his supporters in the Sadrist Movement, the biggest winner of the elections of October 2021 with 773 seats, to be removed from the parliament.
In the last few months, the ongoing disputes between the Shia parties have hindered formation of the new Iraqi government, leaving it impossible to choose an interim President with two-thirds majority of the 329-seat Parliament under the constitution.
If elected the President will nominate the Prime Minister who was nominated by the most powerful coalition in the parliament, currently the CF to create a new government that will rule for four years.
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