On Sunday, Iraq is heading to the polls again, almost two years to the day after national protests had started raging in the country following the previous parliamentary elections.

Mostly young people had called for better economic conditions and infrastructure and an end to corruption and nepotism. The protests had turned bloody with 600 casualties and up to 30,000 injured by security forces and pro-Iranian militias.

Following the protesters' demands, Prime Minister Abdul Mahdi resigned in November 2019. Current Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi took office in May 2020. He started his term with the promise for early elections and a reform of the electoral law.

Despite these promises, the protests continued until July 2021 as a loosely organized movement without a leader. "It's key to note that it was actually COVID that stopped the protests and not the brutal suppression that they were experiencing," Alice Gower, director of geopolitics and security at the London-based political adviser, Azure Strategy, told DW.