Prominent protest figure in Iraq’s Basra assassinated
Shiekh Wessam al-Gharawi, a leading figure of Basra protests who was reportedly assassinated.
Basra (IraqiNews.com) An Iraqi who was among the leaders of protests that swept across Iraq’s southern province of Basra has been assassinated, Iraqi news reports said Sunday.
Sheikh Wessam al-Gharrawi, an outstanding figure during the protests against deteriorating public utilities and water contamination, was killed late Saturday by an unknown attackers outside his house in Mowaffaqiya, central Basra, Kurdistan 24 quoted security sources as saying.
Basra had witnessed violent protests since early September over multiple social grievances, most notably water shortages and contamination. Some Iraqis officials had said Iran pumped contaminated water left over from its farmlands towards Iraqi territories, which prompted some Iraqi protesters to set the Iranian consulate in Basra on fire.
The turmoil was followed by a series of assassinations of a few social figures, including feminist activists, which won condemnation from the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI).