Iraq

29 Oct 2019; MEMO: At least 20 demonstrators were killed and more than 600 others injured yesterday when Iraqi forces attempted to break a protest camp in the southern city of Karbala, as reported on Anadolu Agency.

A security source earlier said anti-riot police moved to disperse “an unlicensed sit-in” in central Karbala.

He said protesters ignored calls by security forces to end their sit-in.

28 Oct 2019; MEMO: Al-Hadath TV channel said on Saturday that Iraq has decided to suspend its work, as well as the work of Al Arabiya. According to Al-Hadath website, the Iraqi police force asked reporters of the two Saudi TV channels to stop any journalism activity in the country.

28 Oct 2019; MEMO: Iraq’s intelligence service provided the US-led coalition with the exact coordinates of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s location, paving the way for the raid that reportedly killed him, an Iraqi intelligence official told Reuters on Sunday.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi security forces on Monday fired tear gas at school and university students who defied a warning from the prime minister and joined anti-government protests that have left more than 200 people dead over the past month.

A spokesman for Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, whose position is increasingly precarious as he faces the largest challenge since he came to power a year ago, said on Sunday that anyone disrupting work or school days would be severely punished.

BAGHDAD (AP) — At least seven more Iraqi protesters were killed Saturday in clashes with security forces in Baghdad and the southern town of Nasiriyah, as thousands took part in nationwide anti-government protests, officials said.

The new violence brought the number of demonstrators killed to 49 in two days of protesting, according to an Associated Press tally. The semi-official Iraq High Commission for Human Rights, which accounts for violence in additional cities in southern Iraq, put the death toll at 63.

26 Oct 2019; MEMO: At least 40 people were killed and more than 2,300 others injured Friday in Iraq on Friday during anti-government protests that erupted near Baghdad’s fortified Green Zone, according to Iraq’s rights commission, Anadolu reports.

In a statement, the Iraq High Commission for Human Rights said fatalities were caused after clashes between protesters and security forces.

BAGHDAD, Oct. 25 (Xinhua) -- The number of refugees crossing the border from northeastern Syria into Iraq has increased significantly in recent days after Turkish military operations in the area, the United Nations warned.

The World Food Programme (WFP) has so far provided food assistance to 8,850 newly-arrived Syrian refugees in Bardarash Camp located in Duhok Province in Iraq's semi-autonomous region of the Kurdistan, the WFP, food-assistance branch of the United Nations, said Friday.

BAGHDAD (AP) — Tens of thousands of people, many of them young and unemployed men, thronged public squares and blocked main streets Friday in the capitals of Iraq and Lebanon in unprecedented, spontaneous anti-government revolts in two countries scarred by long conflicts.

BAGHDAD, Oct. 25 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi on Friday warned of chaos if the government resigns, and promised a cabinet reshuffle, more job opportunities and the establishment of a court to prosecute corrupt officials should he remain in power.

"The resignation of the government today without providing a constitutional alternative means leading the country into chaos," Abdul Mahdi said in his televised speech earlier Friday.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi authorities committed serious human rights violations and abuses in their response to a wave of anti-government protests earlier this month that saw 149 civilians killed, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) said.

In a report by its Human Rights Office published late on Monday, UNAMI said there was evidence that security forces had used excessive force against protesters and made mass arrests. There were also reports that security forces had denied protesters medical treatment, it said.