Iraq

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq closed its airspace Sunday as voters headed to the polls to elect a parliament that, despite widespread skepticism, some Iraqis hope will deliver reforms after decades of conflict and mismanagement.

08 Oct 2021; MEMO: Polling stations have been set up in Iraq today to allow security forces, asylum seekers and prisoners to vote in the general elections on a "special voting day."

Election centres in many districts across the country have opened their doors.

Intensive security measures have been taken at the centres to prevent any terrorist attacks.

30 Sep 2021; MEMO: Iraq's popular political figure and leader of the Sadrist movement, Muqtada Al-Sadr, yesterday called for the implementation of arrest warrants issued against those who took part in the Israel normalisation conference in Erbil, the capital of the Kurdish region in northern Iraq, last week.

Baghdad, Sep 27 (AP-PTI) Representatives from Iran and Saudi Arabia have held a new round of talks in Baghdad, two Iraqi officials said Monday, in the first such meeting between the regional foes since a new president was sworn in in Tehran.

The meeting held last week discussed pending issues between the two countries according to a previously agreed on roadmap, including diplomatic representation between the two countries, according to one Iraqi official.

BAGHDAD, Sept 26 (NNN-NINA) – The Iraqi government yesterday declared its rejection of local calls, for normalisation of relations with Israel, as such a move is “prohibited by Iraqi laws.”

A statement by the media office of Prime Minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, confirmed that “the concept of normalisation is constitutionally, legally, and politically rejected, in the Iraqi state, and that the government clearly expressed Iraq’s firm position in support of the Palestinian right in establishing an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.”

BAGHDAD (AP) — In the Baghdad suburb of Sadr City, glossy election campaign posters are plastered alongside jungles of sagging electrical wires lining the alleyway to Abu Ammar’s home.

But his mind is far from Iraq’s Oct. 10 federal election. The 56-year-old retired soldier’s social welfare payments barely cover the cost of food and medicine, let alone electricity. Despite chronic outages from the national grid, Abu Ammar can’t afford a generator.

BAGHDAD, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Iraqi government on Saturday declared its rejection of local calls for normalization of relations with Israel as such a move is "prohibited by the Iraqi laws."

A statement by the media office of Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi confirmed that "the concept of normalization is constitutionally, legally, and politically rejected in the Iraqi state, and that the government clearly expressed Iraq's firm position in support of the Palestinian right in establishing an independent state with al-Quds (Jerusalem) as its capital."

23 Sep 2021; MEMO: The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has announced that it is to return a 3,600-year-old stone tablet to Iraq. The artefact shows part of the Epic of Gilgamesh, an epic poem from ancient Mesopotamia.

According to the UN, the tablet will be returned at a ceremony in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC today.

23 Sep 2021; MEMO: Iraqi Minister of Water Resources Mahdi Rashid yesterday renewed threats that Baghdad would take Iran to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in relation to his country's water rights, Al Khaleej Online reported.

Mahdi said that Iraq had received information that Iran is digging tunnels and trying to alter the natural water flows.

"We have important cards to use to secure our water rights," the Iraqi minister said in an interview with Al Iraqiya News on Tuesday.

18 Sep 2021; MEMO: Baghdad and Washington agreed on reducing the US combat troops in two military bases in Iraq by the end of September, Anadolu Agency reports.

According to an Iraqi army statement on today, the decision was made during a meeting of the joint military committee in Baghdad on Thursday, which also considered shifting the international coalition in Iraq to a non-combatant role by the end of this year.

The troops will be reduced in the US bases in the western Anbar and northern Erbil provinces.