Al-Sudani honors Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim 15 years after death

BAGHDAD — Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani commemorated the 15th anniversary of Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim’s death on Saturday, praising the former leader of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq for his contributions to the country’s post-dictatorship reconstruction.

“In marking the 15th anniversary of the death of His Eminence Sayyid Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim, we recall his years of jihad and his resistance against dictatorship in pursuit of a free and independent Iraq,” Al-Sudani said. He recognized Al-Hakim’s significant role in laying the foundation of a democratic Iraq, where “all its citizens enjoy dignity, honor, and equality under the constitution and law.”

Al-Sudani extended “deepest condolences and sympathies to His Eminence Sayyid Ammar Al-Hakim, the entire honorable Al-Hakim family, and all admirers and followers of the departed Sayyid on this solemn occasion.”

Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim, a prominent Iraqi Shiite politician and cleric, and father of Ammar Al-Hakim, who played a role in the creation of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, initially named the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, died on Aug. 26, 2009, after a 28-month battle with cancer.

Born in 1950 in Najaf, Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim was the son of Mohsen Al-Hakim, one of the leading Shiite figures in Iraq from 1955 to 1970, and the brother of Mohammed Baqir Al-Hakim, the first president of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

Al-Hakim received Shiite religious education in law and Islamic jurisprudence at the Hawza in Najaf and the Hawza in Qom, Iran.

While maintaining close relations with Iran, Al-Hakim always claimed that these ties would ‘not influence’ his political directions.

Al-Hakim moved to Iran and became one of the founders of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in the 1970s. He led the council’s military wing, the Badr Corps, which has been accused by various parties of carrying out physical eliminations and organized assassinations targeting Sunnis after the invasion of Iraq. The Supreme Council fought against Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War.

Al-Hakim’s prominence rose when he served on the Governing Council of Iraq in the summer of 2003 before becoming its president. His political role expanded significantly after he assumed leadership of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution following the assassination of his brother Mohammed Baqir Al-Hakim in a bomb explosion in Najaf in August of the same year.