Category: Reports

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Reports

What Happens to Water at the End of the Tigris and Euphrates: Water sustains oil fields while Basra runs dry

As Basra’s water crisis deepens, large volumes of water are being diverted to Iraq’s oil fields for reservoir injection. This investigation examines how oil production drains resources from people and farmland in one of the country’s most water-stressed regions.

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Reports

Sexual violence in Iraq: The normalisation of a structural crisis  

This article situates the mass sexual harassment incident in Basra within a broader pattern of systemic violence against women, connecting it to escalating domestic violence in Iraq, a culture of impunity, and moral double standards that hold victims responsible for their presence in the public sphere while allowing perpetrators to go unpunished.

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Reports

From arbiter to actor: The politicisation of Iraq’s courts 

How did the judiciary, an entity meant to be impartial, turn into a central actor in Iraq’s complex political landscape? Is there a way out of this entanglement? This is the story of a judiciary walking a tightrope, pulled from every direction.

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Reports

One state, three memories: Iraq’s divided identity 

One hundred years after the establishment of the Iraqi state, national identity remains elusive: a country unified by borders, yet divided by memory. This piece examines how history, sectarianism, and political rupture have fractured Iraq’s sense of identity — and why the state has repeatedly failed to reconcile them.

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Reports

Drought threatens Babylon’s fig trees: A tree for people, bees, and bulbul songbirds 

A fig tree can live for half a century and begins bearing fruit after its third year. On Saadoun Al-Saadouni’s farm, some trees are older than his eldest son. He tended them with the same care he gave his children. This is a story of fig trees dying in Babylon, one of Iraq’s most fertile provinces.

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Reports

“Bread has become a farmer’s sorrow”: Drought, shrinking farmland, and abandoned harvests in Nineveh

Abed Ibrahim stands stunned before a season unlike any he has ever seen. He planted thousands of tonnes of wheat and barley, and the outcome was devastating. This is the story of farmers in Nineveh abandoned by the rain, the drought, and the state’s agricultural plan.

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Reports

Iraq’s sixth parliament: The votes rise as the political class holds firm 

As Iraq’s sixth parliament takes shape, the faces and forces behind it echo a familiar political class. This piece unpacks the major results of the 2025 parliamentary elections and offers an analysis of the political landscape that lies ahead.

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Reports

Why the secular project failed in Iraq: A critical re-assessment  

This article traces how secular and civil discourse took shape in Iraq after 2003— when it rose to prominence, how it declined, and why it never turned into a decisive political force. This article traces the historical trajectory of this discourse from the Governing Council to the 2025 elections, from unexpected alliances to rapid fragmentation.

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Reports

Iraq’s Sajida Obeid: The voice, the body, the memory

Few artists captured Iraq’s shifting social landscape as vividly as Sajida Obeid. Emerging under the Baʿath regime, surviving the violence of the 2000s, and rising anew in the digital era, she turned taboo subjects—drinking, desire, female autonomy—into shared moments of song and dance. Her work reveals how Iraqis negotiated control, morality, and joy across decades of upheaval.
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Reports

Between reform and repetition: What Iraq’s 2025 elections reveal about trust, power, and accountability 

As Iraq heads into another election cycle, questions loom large over whether the process will deepen reform or further entrench elite dominance. Jummar speaks to political analyst Sajad Jiyad about the prospects for genuine change, the legacy of the Tishreen uprising, and the persistent structural barriers facing Iraqi voters today.