Faiq Al Sheikh Ali

Born in the city of Najaf, south of Baghdad to a prominent religious family (Grandson of Sheikh Ali Al-Murandi born in Morand in Iran), Faiq Al Sheikh Ali has, however been a Secular Liberal throughout his life. He graduated high school from Al-Najaf High School (Arabic: إعدادية النجف) in 1983 and earned his bachelor's degree in law from the University of Baghdad, College of Law and Political Sciences in 1987. He then became a lawyer in 1989 and has been a politician since then.

Sheikh Ali took part in the 1991 uprisings in Iraq and was forced to flee Iraq to Saudi Arabia in 1991. In 1993, he settled in the United Kingdom, where he took part in most meetings and conferences of the Iraqi opposition, the last being the London conference in December 2002. He was an Independent politician in exile, also working as a journalist since 1993 writing hundreds of articles against Saddam Hussein mainly in the Al-Hayat Newspaper and denouncing the Iraqi government's record of human rights violations. He received several death threats by Saddam personally since he did not stop criticising the regime.[5][6]

In a February 2002 letter to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN) and the World Editors Forum expressed their serious concern at the continuing intimidation of Faiq Al Sheikh Ali.[7] They urged Saddam to immediately end his government's systematic suppression of dissenting voices and to fully respect international standards of freedom of expression.

Since July 2014, Faiq Al Sheikh Ali has been a member in both the Judiciary and Human Rights Committees'. He's known for his continuous calls for the dismissal of the current high electoral commission chosen by the previous Council of Representatives of Iraq in 2012 as its nine board of commissioners and most office managers were chosen from the nine largest political parties.[22][23][24] Instead, he wants an independent high electoral commission made up of judges, assigned by the Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council.[25]

In November 2014, he also collected 78 signatures from different members in the parliament, to amend the current 2005 Constitution of Iraq[26] as he believes it was written on the basis of sectarian and ethnic quotas not on the basis of the Iraqi national identity. Sheikh Ali also calls for a fair election law rather than the current one,[27] which favours larger parties.

On 23 October 2016, the Iraqi parliament voted on the law of municipal imports, with its 14th article stating that it is prohibited to import, manufacture and sell alcoholic beverages of all kinds.[28] Sheikh Ali came out very strongly against this article in a press conference, mentioning that it was included in the last minute by some Islamist MP's against the will of most of the Judiciary Committee.[29] He also revealed that the reasons behind this article was to increase trading with the drugs made from the opium poppy seeds and increase the consumption of the drugs that are being smuggled into Iraq from Iran.[30] The conference gained more than one million views on his Facebook page alone[31] the first day it was uploaded and was shared on many different Iraqi social media pages.[32][33][34] It was the talk of the Iraqi media and public street for more than a week after its release.

Faiq Al Sheikh Ali is also a member of the Parliamentarians for Global Action (PGA),[35] since 2014 and is working to get the Iraqi government to sign the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. At the ICC's conference in Milan, on 28 November 2017[36] Sheikh Ali talked about the crimes committed by ISIS in Iraq, criticising the International community for protecting ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria and helping them flee back to Europe.[37][38] He is a defender of Iraqi minorities including Christians and Yazidis and calls for immediate action by the government to secure those who were victims of genocide by ISIS.

After the Civil Democratic Alliance split in December-2017 into two alliances, the current consisting of mostly left-wing leaning parties who stayed as part of the alliance, a second alliance called the Civilized Alliance[39][40] (Arabic: تحالف تمدّن) was formed in January-2018, consisting of four liberal national parties. The alliance aims to establish a civil state based on justice and equal rights & duties for all citizens adopting liberal principles characterized by free & fair elections, separation of powers and the rule of law, ensuring equal protection of human rights, and civil & political freedoms for all. The alliance won three seats and Sheikh Ali retained his seat in Baghdad[41][42]

He supports the presence of American forces in Iraq to counter Iranian encroachment in the country.[43]

Sheikh Ali is also the author of several books written in Arabic, the most famous being The Assassinations of a People[44] (Arabic: اغتيال شعب) written in 1999 and published in February 2000.

Another book of his that came out in six editions is called the Memoirs of the Heir of the Thrones[45] (Arabic: مذكرات وريثة العروش) published at first 2002. In this book, Sheikh Ali wrote the memoirs of the only survivor of 14 July 1958 Iraqi coup d'état Princess Badiya,[46] the daughter of King Ali of Hejaz, and aunt of King Faisal II of Iraq, the last King of Iraq who was killed during the coup along with his aunties and uncle 'Abd al-Ilah, Princess Badiya's brother, who served as Regent of Iraq from 4 April 1939 to 23 May 1953.

Other books include The Arab Sheikhs in the Ottoman Documents (Arabic شيوخ العرب في الوثائق العثمانية) and Secrets of the London Conference 2002 (Arabic: أسرار مؤتمر لندن).[47]