Iraq summons top Western diplomats over statements on protests

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Iraq’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday that it had summoned the ambassadors of four Western countries following statements their embassies made to condemn killings militia groups carried out during protests in central and southern provinces.

The statements came after a night of deadly violence in the Iraqi capital on Friday when unidentified armed persons shot and stabbed protesters in what appeared to be a coordinated effort to crack down on demonstrations.

Iranian-backed Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) militias are suspected of having been behind the Friday killings, among others, which were estimated at 23 deaths, including three police officers, and over a hundred more people wounded.

Three of the diplomats in question were those from Germany, Britain, and France, the mission offices of which issued a joint statement on Sunday following a meeting with Prime Minister of the Iraqi caretaker government, Adil Abdul Mahdi.

“No armed group should be able to operate outside of the control of the state,” the statement from the three European countries said. They “encouraged” Baghdad to implement its recent decision to keep the Hashd al-Shaabi militias away from protest locations.

Read More: Germany, France, UK call on Iraq to keep armed groups away from protest sites

The fourth person the Iraqi Foreign Ministry summoned was Canadian Ambassador to Iraq Ulric Shannon, who officially began his role on Monday.

Shannon’s comments on the protests came in a tweet on Saturday, saying that a state should not allow the existence of “armed groups with private interests,” and calling on the authorities to hold “the criminals” who attacked protesters to account.

A Foreign Ministry official, Abdul Karim Hashem, had met with the ambassadors. He said in a statement that “the mission of ambassadors to Baghdad is to strengthen relations and build a base of common interests without interfering in [Iraq’s] internal affairs.”

Hashem expressed Iraq’s rejection of the contents of the joint European statement, which he considered “unacceptable interference in the internal affairs of Iraq and a clear violation of Article I of the Vienna Agreement that regulates international relations.”

On the protests, the Foreign Ministry statement reiterated that the government had “launched a reform package in response to the demands of the protesters.” It claimed investigations into the breakout of violence were “ongoing” and “have taken legal measures to hold the perpetrators accountable and bring them to justice.”

Since the demonstrations began, over 460 people have died, most of them killed by Iraqi security forces, while 17,600 others have been wounded.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany