AFP, BAGHDAD: Iraq’s parliament gave embattled Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi until Thursday to present a cabinet of technocrats as Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr expanded his protest movement for reform.
Sadr himself spent the night camping in the Green Zone while thousands of his supporters continued a 10-day-old sit-in outside the gates of the fortified area in central Baghdad.
“Parliament is the legitimate representative of the people and it declared that Thursday is the final deadline for the government to present a new ministerial line-up,” a statement from the speaker’s office said on Monday.
Sources in parliament told AFP that 170 lawmakers out of 245 present voted in favour of the deadline.