Japan welcomes electing Samarraie, calls to renew parliament’s activities

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: The Japanese government welcomed the election of Iyad al-Samarraie as speaker of the Iraqi parliament, calling to renew the parliament’s activities. “On the occasion of electing Mr. Iyad al-Samarraie as Speaker of the Iraqi parliament, Japan welcomes the election of al-Samarraie,” the Japanese Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Wednesday received by IraqiNews.com news agency. On April 19, the vote to elect a speaker resulted in Samarraie winning the post with 155 votes. Samarraie, who won the majority of votes, was born in 1946 in the city of Samarra, Salah al-Din province. Samarraie is descending from a renowned family. His father used to be the military attaché in an Arab country before receiving a death sentence and was executed in the 1970s. Samarraie was also a member of the Iraqi Islamic Party (IIP). He climbed up the partisan ladder in Iraq and was tracked down by the former regime in 1980. He received a death sentence and had to leave Iraq for neighboring Jordan, later to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and then to the United Kingdom (UK), where he re-established the IIP. SH (P) 1