One killed, 16 injured in Iraq demos over fuel, power shortages

Baghdad - One person was killed and several injured Wednesday on the fifth day of demonstrations in cities and towns in northern Iraq over electricity and petrol shortages and a deficiency of other essential services.

In the town of Kalar, approximately 160 kilometres south of the city of Sulaimaniya, around 1,000 Kurdish demonstrators gathered in front of the town council building, demanding the provision of essential services for the town's residents.

Police fired in the air to disperse the angry protestors, who pelted the council building with stones.

There were similar scenes of police firing over the heads of stone-throwing protestors outside the local offices of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party, which is headed by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani.

One protestor was killed by a bullet fired by a policemen and fourteen protestors and two policemen were injured during the scuffles, a hospital source told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

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