Revered Iraqi poet Muthaffar al-Nawab dies at 88

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The well-known Iraqi poet Muthaffar al-Nawab has died at the age of 88, the ministry of culture announced on Friday. 

The ministry said in a statement that al-Nawab died of a “terminal disease” without elaborating on the condition the intellectual suffered from.  

Iraqi officials, including the country’s president and prime minister, have extended their condolences.

Al-Nawab’s death is a “great loss for the Iraqi literature,” Hassan Nadhm, the Iraqi minister for cultural affairs said in a statement on Friday. 

The minister pledged to reprint the works of the intellectual so that they could serve as a “source of inspiration” for the country’s readers. 

Before returning to Iraq in 2011, al-Nawab spent decades of his life in exile. 

Born in 1934 in the capital of Baghdad, the Iraqi poet has written numerous works, including many poems critical of Arab regimes.