{"id":14329,"date":"2018-07-17T00:15:45","date_gmt":"2018-07-17T00:15:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/?p=14329"},"modified":"2018-07-17T00:15:45","modified_gmt":"2018-07-17T00:15:45","slug":"8-people-dead-during-a-week-of-protests-over-economic-woes-in-southern-iraq-ministry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/8-people-dead-during-a-week-of-protests-over-economic-woes-in-southern-iraq-ministry\/","title":{"rendered":"8 people dead during a week of protests over economic woes in southern Iraq: Ministry"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Iraqi Heath Ministry says eight demonstrators have so far lost their lives in protests over poor public services and alleged\u00a0corruption in various southern cities in the Arab country since daily protests began in Iraq’s Basra port city a week ago.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The ministry announced the grim news at a press conference in capital Baghdad on Monday, as the growing protests entered their second week with demonstrators rallying to put social problems in the spotlight, decrying poor government services and alleged corruption.<\/p>\n

Earlier in the day, Iraqi Interior Ministry spokesman\u00a0Brigadier General Saad Maan\u00a0said that 487 Iraqis had been wounded in southern Iraq, noting that half of them were security forces.<\/p>\n

Medical sources, however, previously said that at least 11 civilians had been killed in the protests that rocked the southern cities during the past week.<\/p>\n

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<\/p>\n
PressTV-Iraqis protest at Siba gas field amid growing unrest<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

A protest is held at the main entrance to Siba natural gas field following a week of unrest in southern Iraq.<\/p><\/div>\n

On Sunday, hundreds of protesters rallied in Basra, where police used water cannons and tear gas as some of the demonstrators tried\u00a0to storm the provincial government building.<\/p>\n

Basra is an important hub for oil exports which account for over 95 percent of Iraq’s government revenues.<\/p>\n

Long neglected, the city\u00a0is one of the few cities in the Middle East without an effective water treatment system. Many of its waterways are stagnant cesspools, with state officials blaming\u00a0a public funding crisis caused by years of low oil prices. Basra residents had previously warned of more rallies if their demands were not met.<\/p>\n

A similar rally was also staged in the holy city of Najaf on Friday as public anger mounted over unemployment and delivery of basic services. Local sources said hundreds of demonstrators entered the main hall of the city\u2019s airport and walked on to the tarmac, temporarily disrupting air traffic.<\/p>\n

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PressTV-2 more dead in Iraq protests over economic woes<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Earlier in the day, hundreds of protesters rallied in Basra, where police used water cannons and tear gas.<\/p><\/div>\n

On Friday, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, Iraq\u2019s top Shia cleric, issued a statement, expressing solidarity with the protesters. He added that he was concerned about people\u2019s difficult living conditions.<\/p>\n

The protests\u00a0over basic services come at a sensitive time when Iraqi political factions are trying to form a coalition government after the May 12 parliamentary elections.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Iraqi Heath Ministry says eight demonstrators have so far lost their lives in protests over poor public services and alleged\u00a0corruption in various southern cities in the Arab country since daily protests began in Iraq’s Basra port city a week ago. The ministry announced the grim news at a press conference in capital Baghdad on …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":14328,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14329","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-islamic-research"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14329","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14329"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14329\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14330,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14329\/revisions\/14330"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}