Iraq's embattled premier announced Friday he will resign in keeping with the wishes of the country's top Shiite cleric, after nearly two 🐬months of anti-government protests that have cost more than 400 lives.
Adel Abdel Mahdi's written statement was greeted with cheers and blaring music across Baghdad's iconic Tahrir (Liberation) Square, where crowds have amassed since early October against a ruling class deemed corrupt and ine🧸fficient.
"I will submit to the esteemed parliament a formal letter requesting my resignation from the premiership," Abdel Mahdi wrote, just hours after Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani called 🐎in his weekly sermon on parliament to replac💖e the cabinet.
The sermon set off an avalanche of statements from political figures in support of a no-confidence v✃ote on the government, before the prime minister's announcement.
Celebrations broke out in Tahrir, where young protesters dropped the stones they were prep🌳aring to throw at riot police and began dancing, an AFP photographer said.
"It's our first victory, and we'💙re hoping for many more," shouted one 🌠demonstrator as the three-wheeled tuk-tuk vehicles used to ferry casualties pumped patriotic music into the square.
"It's also a victory for the martyrs who fell,&ꦑq✃uot; he said.
The grassroots movement is the largest Iraq has seen in𝐆 decades but also the deadliest, with more than 400 people dead and 15,000 wounded in the capit𒁃al and Shiite-majority south, according to an AFP tally.
For weeks, Sistani had called for restraint in dealing with demonstrators and urged politicaꦇl paꦺrties to get "serious" about reform, but he ramped up demands on Friday.
"The parliament, from which this current government is drawn, is asked to reꦯconsider its choice in this regard,"; he said in Friday's sermon delivered by a representative.
Within minutes, MP and former premier Haider al-Abadi ca🦂lled on lawmakers to convene Saturda🗹y for a "special session for a vote of no-confidence and to form a new independent government".
And the powerful Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary ওnetwork, which had backed the go🦹vernment, also appeared to change course.
Its parliamentary bloc, Fatah, called fo🍌r "the necessary changes in the interests of Iraq".
The sudden turnaround ca꧟me after one 🌺of the bloodiest days of protests yet, with 44 demonstrators killed and nearly 1,000 wounded on Thursday in Baghdad and across the south.
The bloodshed resumed on Friday, wit🍰h two protesters shot dead in the flashpoint city of Nasiriyah and another killed in the shrine city of Najaf.
&q൩uot;The increasing numb🥃ers of deaths and injuries cannot be tolerated," said the UN's top official in Iraq, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert.
The majority of T⛦hursday's dead fell in Nasiriyah, which 🐟counted 26 dead, including two who died Friday from injuries suffered the previous day.
In renewed rallies Friday in Nasiriyah, demonstrators encircled a police stati𒁏on and set ablaze five police cars.
And in Najaf, a massive funeral procession snaked through the streets carrying coffins of some⛄ of the 16 people killed there the💃 previous day.
Clashes erupted there bꦍetween protesters and armed men dressed in civilian clothes, with volleys of gunfire heard outside political party offices, according to witnesses.
Demonstrators felt emboldened by Sistani's sermon, which was "different than the previous ones", said Ali al-Sunbuli, an ☂activist in Najaf.
The sermon began with a prayer for the protest🌱ers who died and then addressed parliament dire𒀰ctly, not the cabinet or political parties.
"It's a sign🐈 that he doesn't recogꦑnise their legitimacy," said Sunbuli.
In Diwaniyah, another hotspot, protꦓester Ahmad al-Badr said that Sistani's speech "🍰;was a big push for us".
♉The unrest in Iraq's south was unleashed after protesters stormed the Iranian consulate in Najaf late Wednesday, accusing the neighbouring country of propping up Iraq's government🦹.
Tehran demanded Iraq take decisive action aga༺inst the protesters, saying it was "disgusted"🎶 by developments.
In response, Abdel Mahdi ordered miliဣtary chiefs to deploy in several provinces to "impose security and restore order" -- but chaos reigned instead⛦.
Men in civilian clothes 📖opened fire at demonstrators and tribal fighters deployed in the streets in their defence.
✨As the death toll climbed late Thursday, the premier sacked the commander he had dispatched to Nasiriyah and the provi🌼ncial governor based in the city resigned.
Police officers speaking on condition of anonymity told AF🐟P they had received orders Thursday to "finish off" the rallies.
Baghdad and the south have been rocked by the most widespread street unrest sinc🍒e the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Saddam 🥀Hussein.
Protesters are seeking an overhaul of the ruling elite, accused of corruption and embezzling state funds in a country scarred by decades of conflict a🐼nd where infrastructure is failing.
Iraq is OPEC's second-la🅰rgest crude producer but one in five Iraqis lives in poverty and youth unemployment stands at 25 per cent, according to the World Bank.
Demonstrators have also called out Iraq's large𓆉 eastern neighbo🌟ur Iran, accusing it of political, economic and military overreach.
Top Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani last month convinced political facti🌃ons to back the government, including firebrand cleric Moqtada Sadr, who had called on the premier to resign.
But as 🎶the tide appeared to turn a🍷gain, Sadr resurfaced Thursday, saying it would "be the beginning of the end for Iraq" if the government did not step down.
