Iraq

SINJAR, Iraq (AP) — One by one, the flags belonging to a patchwork of armed forces were lowered in a northern Iraqi town once brutalized by the Islamic State group. The territorial claims symbolized by each were replaced by the fluttering of just one: The Iraqi state’s.

The hoisting of the national flag in Sinjar, home to Iraq’s Yazidi religious minority, is the result of a deal months in the making for the federal government to restore order from a tangled web of paramilitaries, who sowed chaos in the district during the bedlam following liberation from IS three years ago.

BAGHDAD, Dec 23 (NNN-NINA) – The Iraqi authorities yesterday took several restrictive measures, including a travel ban to eight countries, where the new strain of virus has spread, as the total nationwide infections reached 586,503.

A statement by the media office of Iraqi Prime Minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, said, the Council of Ministers, headed by al-Kadhimi, held a meeting to take new restrictive measures, to protect the Iraqi people from a new strain of virus, that has spread recently in many countries, which is characterised by rapid transmission of infection.

22 Dec 2020; MEMO: British Ambassador to Iraq Stephen Hickey on Sunday blamed an armed groups' evasion for scaring investors and causing instability in the country.

On his Twitter, he wrote: "The rocket attacks on diplomatic missions do not lead except to scaring Baghdad's residents, scaring investment urgently needed for the economy, and increasing fears."

21 Dec 2020; MEMO: At least eight Katyusha rockets landed in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone in an attack targeting the US Embassy, causing some minor damage on the compound on Sunday, the Iraqi military and the embassy said on Sunday, Reuters reports.

21 Dec 2020; MEMO: Thousands of protesters yesterday blocked several main roads leading to oil installations and bridges in oil-rich Basra in southern Iraq demanding the government to pay their delayed salaries.

Eyewitnesses said the protesters, who work as day-rate employees in government institutions including energy facilities, demonstrated in several areas in the province demanding the government pay their salaries which they have not received in months.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - At least eight Katyusha rockets landed in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone in an attack targeting the U.S. Embassy, causing some minor damage on the compound on Sunday, the Iraqi military and the embassy said on Sunday.

The Iraqi military said an “outlaw group” fired eight rockets. Most of the missiles hit a residential complex and a security checkpoint inside the zone, damaging buildings and cars and wounding one Iraqi soldier, a military statement said.

BAGHDAD, Dec 20 (NNN-NINA) – Iraqi Prime Minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, warned of the collapse of social and political systems in Iraq, and overwhelming chaos, if the country does not go through financial reform.

Al-Kadhimi made his comments during an extraordinary session of the Iraqi cabinet, to discuss the federal budget for the fiscal year 2021, which came after the Central Bank of Iraq (CBI) decided to devalue the national currency, due to the economic crisis that resulted from the decline in oil prices.

BAGHDAD, Dec 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) — A well-known Iraqi activist has been killed in Baghdad, fellow activists and local media say.

Salah al-Iraqi was reportedly shot dead by unidentified gunmen in the Baghdad al-Jadida area on Tuesday evening.

Iraqi played an active role in the mass protests against government corruption, high unemployment and dire public services that erupted last year.

In his last Facebook post hours before his death, he had written: “The innocent die while the cowards rule.”

16 Dec 2020; MEMO: Three separate simultaneous bombs targeted liquor stores west of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, causing material damages, the Iraqi security media cell said.

The Iraqi Defence Ministry's Media Cell said in a statement that an unknown group calling itself Ahl Al-Ma'rouf targeted the stores on Monday night using improvised explosive devices or IEDs.

BAGHDAD, Dec 14 (NNN-NINA) – Commando forces of the Iraqi Counter-Terrorism Service (CTS), carried out an operation in Nineveh Province and killed 42 Daesh militants, the Iraqi military said yesterday.

Acting on intelligence reports, the CTS forces, backed by Iraqi and international coalition aircraft, pushed into Ayn al-Jahash, in the south of Nineveh’s provincial capital Mosul, some 400 km north of Baghdad, and fought fierce clashes with the militants for two successive days, Yahia Rasoul, spokesman of the Commander-in-Chief of the Iraqi forces, said.