Iraqi Parliament to elect new President on Thursday

Iraq's Parliament has decided to hold a session on Thursday dedicated to electing the next President of the country.

On Tuesday, Parliament Speaker Mohammed al-Halbousi announced the decision in a press release after a regular session, noting that the agenda for Thursday's session would only include the election of the President, reports Xinhua news agency.

According to the power-sharing system in Iraq after 2003, the presidency should be reserved for the Kurds, the Speaker's post for the Sunnis, and the Prime Minister's post for the Shias.

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So far, disagreement persists between the two major Kurdish parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, over the position of the President.

On Monday, Muhsen Al Mandalawi, first deputy of Parliament Speaker, said in a statement that some 170 lawmakers submitted a request to hold a session on Wednesday dedicated to electing the next president of the country, in an attempt to end the political deadlock a year after the October 10 elections last year.

Political tensions in Iraq have escalated in the past months between the Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and Sadrist Movement, the biggest winner in the October parliamentary elections in 2021, and his rivals in the Shia parliamentary parties in the Coordination Framework (CF).

Al-Sadr demanded in the past weeks to dissolve Parliament and hold early elections, but his demands were rejected by the CF parties which became the largest bloc after al-Sadr ordered his followers to withdraw from Parliament in June.

Over the past months, persistent disputes between the Shia parties have hampered the formation of a new government, which requires a two-thirds majority of the 329-seat Parliament under the Iraqi constitution.

Indo-Asian News Service