Iraqi demonstrators disband

Protest in Green Zone ends; ISIS car bombs kill 31

Iraqi security forces stand guard as supporters of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr leave Baghdad’s highly fortified Green Zone on Sunday.
Iraqi security forces stand guard as supporters of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr leave Baghdad’s highly fortified Green Zone on Sunday.

BAGHDAD -- Anti-government protesters disbanded at least temporarily Sunday from the heavily fortified Green Zone they had stormed a day earlier after the Islamic State militant group carried out its second major attack in Iraq in as many days -- a pair of car bombs that killed more than 30 people.

The country's political crisis intensified Saturday when hundreds of supporters of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr tore down walls and poured into the zone, which is home to the seat of the Iraqi government and most foreign embassies. Loudspeaker announcements on Sunday evening urged protesters to leave peacefully. When the call came, hundreds calmly packed up and left, carrying flags and overnight bags away with them.

Addressing the demonstrators, Akhlas al-Obaidi, a protest organizer, urged people to go home to give political decision-making a chance and to commemorate the death of eighth-century Imam Mousa al-Kadhim. She said they would return Friday to make a "major stand."

In a televised statement, organizers said they would take further action unless the Council of Representatives approves a Cabinet including independents proposed by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi.

Earlier in the day, the demonstrators had picnicked and chanted against politicians they deemed corrupt, while also enjoying what was for some their first sight of Baghdad's most iconic landmarks. The Green Zone is home to parliament, ministries and embassies and has been sealed off by blast walls and checkpoints for 13 years.

Later, families walked through the compound's smoothly paved streets and snapped pictures beside its well-watered gardens, and young men bathed in a fountain. Such scenes are entirely divorced from the rest of the city's crumbling infrastructure and neglected public spaces.

The Green Zone has long been the focus of al-Sadr's criticism that the government is detached from the people.

Not far away, al-Abadi held a meeting with the president, the parliamentary speaker and other political leaders to try to steer the country out of political turmoil, which is threatening to unseat him.

A statement released after their meeting said they planned "intense" meetings between political parties in the coming days to work on government changes. It also condemned the ransacking of parliament and ordered that the perpetrators be brought to justice.

The withdrawal of the protesters gives al-Abadi some breathing room, but he has struggled to implement any meaningful political changes despite months of trying. Al-Sadr is demanding an end to a quota system, set up after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, under which political positions are divided up based on sect and ethnicity.

Yet al-Abadi's efforts to reshuffle his Cabinet has been stalled by bickering in a split parliament.

Last summer, demonstrations demanding better government services mobilized millions across Iraq and pressured al-Abadi to submit his first package of overhaul proposals. However, months of stalled progress followed, and in recent months al-Sadr's well-organized supporters took over the protest movement.

Despite the subdued end to the latest protest, Iraqi officials fear the precedent set by the Green Zone breach will continue to undermine the country's security.

Earlier Sunday, car bombs in the southern city of Samawah killed 31 people and wounded at least 52. A police officer said two parked cars filled with explosives were detonated within minutes of each other about midday, the first near government offices and the second at an open-air bus station less than a mile away.

On Saturday, an Islamic State-claimed bombing in a market filled with Shiite civilians in Baghdad killed at least 21 people and wounded at least 42 others.

The attacks were the latest in a series of Islamic State-claimed bombings in Iraq. The United Nations said that at least 741 Iraqis were killed in April due to ongoing violence. On March 25, an Islamic State-claimed suicide bombing attack on a stadium filled with children killed 29 and wounded 60.

"The political crisis is having a very negative influence on our war against Daesh," said Iraqi lawmaker Younadim Kanna, using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. "I can tell you Daesh is very happy that there are these demonstrations in Baghdad," he said, explaining that the instability in the Iraqi capital was pulling security forces away from the front-line fight against the Islamic State and from the perimeter security of the Iraqi capital.

Baghdad Operations Command confirmed that additional security forces were deployed Saturday to the Green Zone after protesters breached its walls. In March, political instability in Baghdad pulled Iraqi units away from the front and brought operations against the Islamic State in Anbar to a near halt.

While the Islamic State has suffered many territorial defeats in the past year, the group still controls significant pockets of territory in Iraq's north and west, including the country's second-largest city of Mosul, estimated to still be home to more than 1 million civilians.

Al-Sadr's office in Baghdad denied that the demonstration was jeopardizing the fight against the Islamic State but conceded that the decision to disband Sunday was made partly for security reasons.

Organizers decided to end the protest because of an annual Shiite pilgrimage to the shrine of an eighth century imam in Baghdad that is expected to attract thousands from across the country, said Sadiq al-Hashemi, a representative of al-Sadr's office in Baghdad who was present at the protests.

The protests will resume after the pilgrimage ends this week, al-Hashemi said, adding that the al-Sadr movement would also give Iraqi lawmakers one more chance to vote in new changes to the government.

"We have achieved something here. We got our message out from the Iraqi street," Al-Hashemi said.

But lawmakers and Iraqi security officials say al-Sadr's show of force is undermining the country's leadership at a critical time and sets a dangerous precedent.

"They could just do it again," said lawmaker Hanan al-Fatlawi, referring to the Green Zone breach. "This is not a real solution. They showed no respect for the rule of law."

As they passed the parliament building they overran a day earlier, protesters said Iraq's lawmakers have already had their chance to achieve change in the halls of government.

"They don't really want reform," said Hussein Ahmed Tariq, 19, who camped with protesters overnight. "We gave them so much time, and each time they said the next day and the next day. We reached a point where we realized they don't want to vote at all."

Information for this article was contributed by Susannah George, Sinan Salaheddin, Karim Kadim, Murtada Faraj and Maamoun Youssef of The Associated Press; by Loveday Morris, Mustafa Salim and Erin Cunningham of The Washington Post; and by Kadhem Al-Attabi and Ziad Haris of Deutsche Press-Agentur.

A Section on 05/02/2016

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