Iraqi Kurdish women work at a hand-weaving Kurdish traditional carpet shop, in the district of Raniya, about 70 kilometres (43 miles) east of Arbil, the capital of Iraq's northern autonomous Kurdish region, on February 11, 2025. (Photo by Safin Hamid/AFP Photo)

Female Kurdish Peshmerga fighters affiliated with Iran's separatist Kurdistan Freedom Party (PAK), are pictured at a base in an undisclosed location in the Arbil province, the capital of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, on December 1, 2022. Iranian-Kurdish rebel groups have for decades sought refuge in northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region, but they have recently come under fresh fire amid weeks of protests in the neighbouring Islamic republic. (Photo by Safin Hamed/AFP Photo)

An Iraqi soldier stands guard as a pipeline burns in the background after an explosion 30 kilometers (20 miles) northeast of Tikrit, Iraq, Monday, February 11, 2008. (Photo by Bassem Daham/AP Photo)

An Iraqi demonstrator runs as others burn tyres to cut-off roads in the southern city of Basra on November 25, 2019. (Photo by Hussein Faleh/AFP Photo)

U.S. Marine Lt. Ben Reid from 1/2 Charlie Company of Task Force Tarawa waits to be medivaced after being hit with shrapnel and a machine gun round, in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah, on March 23, 2003. The Marines suffered a number of deaths and casualties during gun battles throughout the city. (Photo by Joe Raedle via The Atlantic)

A girl catches a fish in the marshes of the southern district of Chibayish in Dhi Qar province, about 120 kilometres northwest of the southern city of Basra, on September 23, 2020. Iraq's southern marshes are blossoming thanks to a wave of ecotourists picnicking and paddling down their replenished river bends. (Photo by Hussein Faleh/AFP Photo)

A child runs towards Mohamed Maarouf, 28, as he walks with a sack of gifts while dressed in Saint Nicholas (Santa Claus) costume in a slum near the centre of Iraq's southern city of Basra on December 24, 2021. (Photo by Hussein Faleh/AFP Photo)

A man takes a block of ice out of an ice factory for sale in Iraq's southern city of Basra on July 8, 2023. (Photo by Hussein Faleh/AFP Photo)