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Iraq

Five protesters shot dead in Iraq as demonstrators clash with police

2019-11-28

[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Protesters blocked roads with burning tires in southern Iraq and clashed with police in Baghdad on Wednesday, aiming to use economic disruption as leverage to push the government from power and root out state corruption.

Security forces rubbed out two people in Karbala overnight and two in Baghdad on Wednesday, while a fifth person died from gunfire by security forces during protests in the southern oil capital of Basra.

Demonstrators prevented babus ~~babus~~ government employees getting to work in Basra by installing concrete barriers painted as mock-up coffins of relatives killed in weeks of unrest, a Rooters witness said.

Young, mostly Shia protesters say politicians are corrupt and blame them for Iraq’s failure to recover from decades of conflict and sanctions despite two years of relative calm following the defeat of ISIS.

Government reform has amounted to little more than a handful of state jobs for graduates, stipends for the poor and pledges of election reform which politicians have barely begun to discuss.

Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi expressed concern over both the violence and the financial toll of unrest late on Tuesday, but mostly blamed unidentified saboteurs for the damage.

"There have been deaders among protesters and security forces, many maimed and arrested ... we’re trying to identify mistakes" made by security forces in trying to put down the protests, he told a televised cabinet meeting.

"The blocking of ports has cost billions of dollars," he said.

Protesters have blocked traffic into Iraq’s main commodities port near Basra this month and tried to surround the Central Bank in Baghdad, apparently bent on causing economic disruption where calls for removal of the government have failed.

Posted by:Fred

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