Mohammed Shia' Al Sudani

Muhammad Shayya al-Sudani (born 4 March 1970) is an Iraqi politician who has been the Prime Minister of Iraq since 27 October 2022. Prior to his premiership, he held a number of ministerial positions; namely, Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, acting Minister of Industry and Minerals, acting Minister of Trade, acting Minister of Migration and the Displaced, acting Minister of Finance, acting Minister of Agriculture, and Minister of Human Rights.

Furthermore, he has also held the position of Governor of Maysan, and Mayor of Amarah. On 19 January 2019, al-Sudani founded the Furatayn Movement and has been its leader since. In 2025, '' The Muslim 500'' included him among the most influential Muslim politicians.

Early life and education

Al-Sudani was born in Baghdad on 4 March 1970, to a middle-class Shia Arab family. Hailing originally from the province of Maysan in southern Iraq, his father worked as an employee at the Agricultural Cooperative Bank of Iraq. His father as well as five other members of his family were executed for being members of the Islamic Dawa Party, a banned party at the time that opposed the Ba'athist rule of Saddam in Iraq.

Al-Sudani graduated from the University of Baghdad and holds a bachelor's degree in agricultural science and a master's degree in project management.

Career

Early career

In 1997, al-Sudani was appointed to the Maysan Agriculture Office. He subsequently was appointed to a number of senior positions in the office such as the head of the Agriculture department, head of Ali Al-Sharqi City Agriculture department, and head of Agricultural Production department. He was also the supervising engineer in the National Research Program with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

Early political career

After the invasion of Iraq in 2003, al-Sudani worked as a coordinator between the Maysan province administration and the Coalition Provisional Authority. In 2004 he was appointed Mayor of Amarah City, and in the 2005 provincial elections he was elected as a member of Maysan Provincial Council. He was re-elected in 2009 and appointed Governor of Maysan.

Minister of Human Rights

He was appointed by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki as the Minister of Human Rights after the 2010 parliamentary election, being approved by parliament on 21 December 2010.

His ministry was in charge of finding mass graves in Iraq that occurred during the regime of Saddam Hussein. Two were found in 2011, one in Anbar and another in Al Diwaniyah. During 2011, he was briefly chairman of the Supreme National De-Baathification Commission, Justice and Accountability Commission for De-Ba'athification, which had the power to bar individuals from government for links to the former ruling Ba'ath Party. He coordinated with the ministry of migration to help Iraqi citizens residing in Syria to return to Iraq during the Syrian Civil War. He was minister in August 2014 when thousands of Yazidis were massacred in northern Iraq by the Islamic State (ISIS or Daesh). He described it as "a vicious atrocity" and said it was the "responsibility of the international community to take a firm stand against the Daesh" and to "start the war on Daesh to stop genocides and atrocities against civilians". He asked the United Nations Human Rights Council to launch an investigation into crimes against civilians committed by ISIS. He described their crimes as amounting to genocide and crimes against humanity. "We are facing a terrorist monster", he explained. "Their movement must be curbed. Their assets should be frozen and confiscated. Their military capacities must be destroyed."

Minister of Labour and Social Affairs

He was appointed minister of Labour and Social Affairs in 2014, and his post in the ministry of human rights was succeeded by Mohammed Mahdi Ameen al-Bayati in October 2014, when the government of Haider al-Abadi took office.

Acting minister

During his political career, Al-Sudani has worked as the acting minister of a number of ministries: Agriculture, Finance, Migration and the Displaced, Industry and Minerals, and Trade.

Prime minister

In a bid to end the 2022 Iraqi political crisis, the coordination framework officially nominated Al-Sudani for the post of prime minister in May 2022. He succeeded in forming a government, which was approved by the Council of Representatives on 27 October.

In January 2023, in an interview with ''The Wall Street Journal'', al-Sudani defended the presence of U.S. troops in his country and set no timetable for their withdrawal, referring to the U.S. and NATO troop contingents that train and assist Iraqi units in countering the Islamic State, but largely stay out of combat, though he mentioned that the U.S.-led military coalition in Iraq is no longer needed.

''The Economist'' has said that al-Sudani is affiliated with the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), and his tenure has seen their influence further increase in Iraq. His government has increased the number of troops for the PMF by 116,000, increasing the total number to around 230,000, and has set its budget to US$2.7 billion. It has also launched a building company affiliated with the PMF, named after killed PMF commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis; the company gives preferential access to government contractors and the government has awarded the company with strategic land.

On 20 July 2023, al-Sudani expelled the Swedish ambassador to Iraq and revoked work permits for Swedish companies after Sweden permitted a planned Quran burning.

On 10 October 2023, al-Sudani arrived in Moscow and met with Russian president Vladimir Putin. On 21 October 2023, he called for a ceasefire in the Gaza war. In November 2023, during a meeting with Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi, he described the Hamas attack on Israel as "a result of years of criminal policies of the Zionist regime against the people of Gaza."

On 17 February 2024, he met with German chancellor Olaf Scholz in Munich while he was attending the Munich Security Conference where he met with various world leaders.

In April 2024, al-Sudani condemned the Israeli bombing of the Iranian embassy in Damascus. Also in this same month he visited the United States and met with President Joe Biden. Also he received the Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and they signed a revolutionary project called the Iraq Development Road.

In May 2024, he attended the memorial ceremony for late President Ebrahim Raisi, who died in a helicopter crash, in the Iranian capital, Tehran.

In September of 2024 at the UNGA he condemned the Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon and met various leaders who discussed bilateral relations with him.

During the 2024 Syrian opposition offensives against the Assad regime, he stated that "what is happening in Syria today is in the interest of the Zionist entity Israel, which deliberately bombed Syrian army sites in a way that paved the way for terrorist groups to control additional areas in Syria." However, he avoided intervening in the conflict on the side of Bashar al-Assad despite pressure to do so from some domestic groups.

In April 2025, he made an unannounced visit to Qatar and met with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa and Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.

Personal life

Al-Sudani is married and has four sons.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sudani, Mohammed Shia
Living people
1970 births
Iraqi Muslims
University of Baghdad alumni
Human rights ministers of Iraq
Industry ministers of Iraq
Labour ministers of Iraq
Social affairs ministers of Iraq
Governors of Maysan Governorate
Prime ministers of Iraq
Maysan Governorate in the Iraq War