This is the last article you can read this month
You can read more article this month
You can read more articles this month
Sorry your limit is up for this month
Reset on:
Please help support the Morning Star by subscribing here
INFLUENTIAL Islamist cleric Moqtada al-Sadr called for “a million man march” to drive out US troops from Iraq, days after the country’s Parliament voted for their expulsion.
“The skies, land and sovereignty of Iraq are being violated every day by occupying forces,” Mr Sadr said, calling for unified peaceful demonstrations opposing their presence.
His call comes days after the Iraqi parliament voted 170-0 in favour of a non-binding resolution for US forces to leave the country in the wake of the targeted assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani at Baghdad International airport.
The cleric — who heads the Sairoun Coalition, an electoral bloc which includes the Iraqi Communist Party — blasted the government’s response as “weak.”
He insisted that a date must be set for US troops to leave the country and presented a list of demands to the Iraqi government calling on it to act.
Mr Sadr hosted a meeting of opposition forces in the Iranian city of Qom, including Kataib Hizbollah, an armed Islamist group who lost 25 fighters in a US missile attack earlier this month.
They discussed a unified response to the call for an end to the US presence in Iraq. Sadr Movement spokesman Amir al-Kanani indicated that the march could take place as soon as this Friday.
“After the Parliament voted to expel foreign troops, a timeline for them to move should be set. The call for a march is aimed at all Iraqis in order to increase the pressure on the Iraqi government,” he said.
“Co-ordination committees across Iraq will be responsible for finalising when and where the march will be held. It might be just in Baghdad or across several major cities,” Mr Kanani added.
But it could see tension between the Islamists and anti-government protesters who rejected Mr Sadr’s call and insisted that the priority must be the removal of the US-Iranian conflict from Iraqi territory.
Speaking to al-Jazeera, university student Jaber al-Khalili said: “We reject these calls [for the march] because they have nothing to do with our demands.
“We are not interested in Sadr’s calls or those of any other political leader. We want them [political leaders] all gone.”
Iraq remains in political deadlock after Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi resigned from his post on November 29 2019. Parliamentary factions have yet to agree on his successor.
