Renewed anti-government protests across Iraq left more than 40 people dead on Friday.
The protests represent a second phase of a week-long movement in early October that ended with more than 150 people dead.
Parliament is scheduled to meet on Saturday to discuss the protests further.
Security forces imposed a curfew across several southern provinces late Friday.
The country ranks as OPEC’s second-biggest oil producer — and the 12th most corrupt nation in the world, according to Transparency International.
But protesters said this year’s demonstrations were unprecedented because of their independence and the violence with which they were met.
At least 157 people were killed in the first few days of October, according to a government probe, a vast majority of them protesters in Baghdad.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Friday said the deaths were the result of “substantial” rights violations.
Via ABC News
