Candidates Withdrawal of Iraq's Elections Raises Doubt over its Integrity

Protesters hold pictures of people who have been killed in anti-government protests during a demonstration calling for the government to resign, in Baghdad, Iraq, on November 29, 2020. (AP)
Protesters hold pictures of people who have been killed in anti-government protests during a demonstration calling for the government to resign, in Baghdad, Iraq, on November 29, 2020. (AP)
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Candidates Withdrawal of Iraq's Elections Raises Doubt over its Integrity

Protesters hold pictures of people who have been killed in anti-government protests during a demonstration calling for the government to resign, in Baghdad, Iraq, on November 29, 2020. (AP)
Protesters hold pictures of people who have been killed in anti-government protests during a demonstration calling for the government to resign, in Baghdad, Iraq, on November 29, 2020. (AP)

The Iraqi Independent High Electoral Commission said dozens of candidates decided to drop out of the country's parliamentary elections scheduled for October 10, raising doubts over the poll's credibility.

This came as hundreds of candidates had their candidacy withdrawn over their ties to the Baath party.

The Commission's spokesman, Hasan Salman, said the withdrawal requests are under review, noting that some might be rejected.

According to Salman, the electoral commission was not concerned if the decisions to drop out were personal choices or came under pressure, but rather cares if the candidates's requests met certain criteria.

Notably, the UN Security Council unanimously approved an Iraqi request for a UN team to monitor the upcoming parliamentary elections.

In 2019, tens of thousands of Iraqi protesters took to the streets against a government seen by demonstrators as corrupt, during which nearly 600 people have died.

The deaths sparked outrage across the country and prompted the resignation of then-premier Adel Abdel Mahdi.



UN, Aid Group Slam Israel’s Gaza Blockade after Report Warns of Famine Risk

This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)
This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)
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UN, Aid Group Slam Israel’s Gaza Blockade after Report Warns of Famine Risk

This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)
This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)

A senior United Nations official said Monday’s hunger report in Gaza is “extremely concerning” given that the strip’s roughly 2 million population continues to face “a very critical risk of famine.”

Beth Bechdol, deputy director of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, said Gaza’s food system has collapsed since Israel reimposed its blockade.

“We are moving into a period where the entire population of the Gaza Strip ... are continuing to face a very critical risk of famine and extreme hunger and malnutrition,” she said in an interview.

Mahmoud Alsaqqa, food security coordinator for the charity Oxfam, meanwhile, slammed Israel’s blockade, saying that thousands of aid trucks carrying aid were prevented from reaching desperate civilians.

“Gaza’s starvation is not incidental—it is deliberate, entirely engineered,” he said. “It is unconscionable and is being allowed to happen.”

Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, a leading international authority on the severity of hunger crises, said outright famine is the most likely scenario unless conditions change.

Nearly half a million Palestinians are in “catastrophic” levels of hunger, meaning they face possible starvation, the report said, while another million are at “emergency” levels of hunger.