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No ex-PM should vie for Iraq premiership: Sistani

September 10, 2018
A handout picture released by the Iraqi Prime Minister’s office on Monday shows Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi (L) meeting with local officials in the southern-Iraqi city of Basra, where protests over government neglect had escalated into deadly violence. After 12 protesters were killed and many of Basra’s institutions torched last week, calm returned to the city as Abadi’s political rivals in Baghdad announced their intention to form Iraq’s next government without him. — AFP
A handout picture released by the Iraqi Prime Minister’s office on Monday shows Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi (L) meeting with local officials in the southern-Iraqi city of Basra, where protests over government neglect had escalated into deadly violence. After 12 protesters were killed and many of Basra’s institutions torched last week, calm returned to the city as Abadi’s political rivals in Baghdad announced their intention to form Iraq’s next government without him. — AFP

By RiyadH Mansour

Baghdad
— Iraqi parliamentary sources said that deputies in a memo asked the government to stop interference of foreign embassies in Iraq’s internal affairs.

This follows a war of words between the US and Iranian embassies and their interference in the sovereignty of Iraq.

However, a number of deputies refused to sign the memo. The sources said the memo will be presented to the government with the signatures of deputies who are for it.

There are eight nominations for the speaker’s post, according to parliament sources.

Iraq’s Shiite spiritual leader Ali Al-Sistani’s office released a statement that he was not supportive of “politicians who have been in authority in the past years” nominating themselves as country’s next prime minister.

In a statement released on Monday, Sistani’s office said earlier reports that he had rejected specific individuals for the post of prime minister were inaccurate and cited his agreement with Iraqi constitution that dictates the largest parliamentary bloc with right to name a candidate.

“From here, rejection hasn’t been expressed by the religious Marja.

“It didn’t name any individuals to a certain side concerning the matter.

Multiple sides which communicated with it [the Marja] — directly or indirectly — were told that it doesn’t support the next prime minister if it is chosen from the politicians who have been in authority in the past years, without distinguishing between the party individuals or the independents,” the statement published on Sistani’s website read.

Earlier in the day, Sabah Al-Saedi, an official in the Sairoon Alliance that is part of the Reform and Construction Bloc, said he was “officially” informed that Sistani refused five of the proposed names for the premiership, including Haider Al-Abadi.

Saedi said that Sistani informed the Iranian negotiator in a meeting in Najaf that Haider Al-Abadi, Nouri Al-Maliki, Hadi Al-Amiri, Falih Alfayyadh and Tariq Najm “have no luck” in holding a premiership post in the next Iraqi Cabinet.


September 10, 2018
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