Muqtada al-supporters Sadr's have gathered in front of the Supreme Judicial Council of the nation, expanding a sit-in that first started in front of the parliament building, and raising their calls for the dissolution of parliament.
Government buildings and embassies, which are both located in Baghdad's heavily protected Green Zone as a result of American occupation, are at the centre of a political uproar in the nation right now.
“These supporters came from the area in front of the parliament,” said Al Jazeera’s Mahmoud Abdelwahed, reporting from outside the Supreme Judicial Council on Tuesday. “They say that they are requesting that the Judicial Council dissolves the parliament, and obliges concerned authorities to hold early elections as a way to get out of the current political impasse.”
The Federal Supreme Court and the Supreme Judicial Council responded by claiming they had received threats and had postponed court proceedings.
Al-Sadr gave the judiciary a week to dissolve the legislature in a warning on Wednesday, but the Supreme Judicial Council has said that it lacks the authority to do so.
After elections in October, the followers of the Shia religious leader, who has become a more significant political force in Iraq over the past ten years, became the largest party in the legislature.
Al-Sadr urged his parliamentary bloc to resign from their seats collectively in June, which they duly did. However, they were unable to establish a government.
Al-Sadr’s supporters have taken to the streets ever since and stormed parliament in July.
In return, supporters of al-Sadr’s Iran-backed rivals, the Coordination Framework Alliance (CFA), have held protests in August near the Green Zone, raising fears of a clash between the two groups.
Political crisis
The unrest at Iraq’s judiciary has forced the country’s caretaker Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi to return to the country from a regional summit in Egypt.
Al-Kadhimi said that the suspension of the judiciary risked pushing the country into “grave dangers”, and called for political talks to restart.
The United Nations also called for the judiciary to be allowed to carry out its work.
“The right to peaceful protest is an essential element of democracy,” a UN statement said. “Equally important is the assertion of constitutional compliance and respect for state institution. State institutions must operate unimpeded in service of the Iraqi people, including the SJC [Supreme Judicial Council].”
While both al-Sadr and his CFA rivals belong to Iraq’s religious Shia bloc, al-Sadr has attempted to portray himself as an Iraqi nationalist, in contrast to what is perceived as the CFA’s pro-Iran ideology.
However, al-Sadr himself has had close ties to Iran in the past, and many critics worry about his potential to lead Iraq into violence.