Female activist involved in Basra protests shot dead

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – A female human rights activist who was actively involved in the Basra protests was assassinated in broad daylight on Tuesday in an armed attack.

Security camera footage shows a gunman opening fire at human rights activist Suad al-Ali, in the Abbasiyah area in central Basra. She instantly died while her husband, now being treated in the hospital, was seriously injured.

فديو اغتيال الناشطة الحقوقية سعاد العلي، في #البصرة pic.twitter.com/xRUxMZYzfY

— Husham Alhashimi (@hushamalhashimi) September 25, 2018

According to the BBC, she was the head of an organization called al-Weed al-Alaiami For Human Rights.

For the past three months, people in Basra have staged many protests, which later spread to other Iraqi cities, demanding better public services, clean water, regular electricity supply, employment, and an end to widespread corruption in Iraqi government institutions.

During the demonstrations, dozens of protestors were killed.

The assassination now raises fears protestors, organizers, and activists are being targeted.

“There’s a worrying trend of targeted attacks on organizers and activists associated with Basra protests,” Mehiyar Kathem, a research associate at University College London, wrote on his Twitter account.

Iraqi activist Ali Amer called on the Iraqi government to investigate the case immediately and present the results to the public.

“Democracy is in danger,” he wrote on Twitter.

Activists recently told the Associated Press of a campaign of intimidation and arbitrary detentions by powerful Iranian-backed Shia militias and political groups in Basra, a city of over two million people in southern Iraq.

During the protests, demonstrators burned the headquarters of Iranian-backed groups and Iran’s consulate in Basra amid public outrage at perceived government indifference toward an underserved and beleaguered populace.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany