The protest in Iraq, which has already killed 350 people in two months, reached Wednesday, November 27, a new level. Protesters set fire to the Iranian consulate in Najaf after a deadly day of a movement topple power in Baghdad and its sponsor, Tehran.
In the evening, in the middle of high flames that devoured the emblem of the Islamic Republic on the wall of the diplomatic representation, hundreds of young people shouted "Iran outside" and "victory to Iraq" inside of the diplomatic complex, AFP journalists have found.
This fire in the symbolic holy Shiite city of Najaf, which hosts millions of Shia pilgrims, mostly Iranian, marks a turning point.
Iran's consulate in the country's other holy city, Kerbala, had already angered protesters earlier this month, but the Iraqi security forces had retaliated, killing four people.
Raised blankets, cartons and tires thrown into Iranian consulate
This time, under the pressure of hundreds of protesters, their tear gas canisters made about 50 wounded, according to medical sources and they eventually withdraw while protesters sharpened their weapons.
They brought blankets, cardboard boxes, tires, whatever came to hand, burned them, and then thrown on the building, visibly deserted.
The protesters targeted this building in particular because they accuse Tehran of pulling the strings in Iraq. For them, in one of the world's most oil-rich countries, but also one of the most corrupt, the political system devised by the Americans who toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003 is running out of steam.
And most importantly, he has fallen into the hands of Iran and its powerful emissary for Iraqi affairs, General Qassem Soleimani, in charge of the external operations of the ideological army of the Islamic Republic.
On the street since October 1, tens of thousands of Iraqis are calling for the overhaul of the political system and the total renewal of their ruling class that they consider corrupt. Officially, 410 billion euros have been diverted in the last 16 years, twice the country's GDP.
With AFP