Recent movements by a member of the U.S. Congress against the Supreme Judicial Council in Iraq have highlighted a controversial judicial figure who has stirred extensive debate during his tenure in Iraq's judiciary. U.S. Congressman Mike Waltz stated on social media platform "X" that the President of the Supreme Judicial Council of Iraq, Faik Zidan, "is at the heart of Iran's plot to turn Iraq into a client state." In response, Baghdad rejected these statements, deeming them "a blatant intervention in Iraqi affairs." The Iraqi Foreign Ministry stated that "trying to influence the judiciary is an assault on the fundamental components of the state's existence." The Foreign Ministry's statement did not reference Iran but rejected Congressman Waltz's comments as "an affront to the person of the President of the Judiciary, Judge Faik Zidan, and to the fundamental rights of the Iraqi state, of which the judiciary is the primary guarantor of rights and freedoms."
The website "Washington Free Beacon" reported that Congressman Waltz, who serves on the Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees, would propose an amendment to a bill that would label the Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council and its president as "assets controlled by Iran." According to the website, this "historic measure would expose a prominent Iraqi leader and shame him for being a tool of Iranian influence" in Iraq. Waltz and sources in Congress working on this issue said that this effort is "a first step towards isolating Iranian assets within the Iraqi government and curbing Iran's growing influence."
Iran has influence in Iraq through its relationships with political entities, such as the "Coordination Framework," which is a political alliance of Iran-affiliated parties, and through its support for armed factions and militias within Iraqi territory.
### Who is Faik Zidan?
Faik Zidan, aged 57, has served as the President of the Supreme Judicial Council since January 2017 and is also the President of the Iraqi Court of Cassation. After completing his advanced studies in law, he worked as a lawyer in Iraq during the 1990s before being appointed as a judge in Baghdad, according to the "Hammurabi" magazine published by the Iraqi Judiciary Association. Zidan worked in civil and criminal courts in Baghdad from 1999 until 2005, before becoming the head of the Central Investigative Court specialized in combating terrorism and significant crimes until 2012. In that year, he was appointed to the Federal Supreme Court in Iraq and then in 2014 became Vice President of the Court of Cassation, which he headed in 2016, one year before assuming the presidency of the Supreme Judicial Council following the issuance of a law appointing the President of the Court of Cassation to the Supreme Judicial Council.
According to Fox News, Zidan is the judge responsible for issuing an arrest warrant for former U.S. President Donald Trump due to the U.S. raid that killed former Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani and former Deputy Head of Popular Mobilization Units Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in January 2020. The Supreme Judicial Council in Iraq issued an arrest warrant for Trump in 2021, charging him with premeditated murder, punishable by death upon conviction.
In 2022, during a political crisis in Iraq between the Sadrist Movement and the "Coordination Framework" regarding who should hold the position of Prime Minister, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Michael Knights, stated that "the Coordination Framework executed a judicial coup in early 2022, in partnership with the commander of the Quds Force in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Esmail Qaani, and the President of the Supreme Judicial Council, Faik Zidan." He noted that Zidan and Qaani met at the home of former Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in January 2022, where Zidan received instructions from Maliki and the Iranian general. Knights added: "The current judicial coup involved directives to the President of the Supreme Judicial Council, Judge Faik Zidan, to facilitate a series of rulings in the Federal Supreme Court under his jurisdiction, which were quickly brought forth in early 2022. Most importantly, the Federal Supreme Court effectively annulled the option of appointing the (parliament) president by simple majority if efforts to achieve a two-thirds majority failed, thereby effectively undermining Muqtada al-Sadr's efforts to form a majority government of 165 seats with the participation of Sunni Arab and Kurdish factions."
### New Horizons of Influence
In an interview with Fox News, Knights, a researcher specializing in military and security affairs of Iraq, Iran, and Gulf countries, stated that Zidan "is a judge ... powerful as the Prime Minister of Iraq. He is also unelected and appointed by Iran and has no fixed term." At the beginning of 2023, Iraqi local media reported Zidan stating that the assassination of Soleimani and al-Muhandis was "a treacherous crime that has no legal basis." In a speech on the third anniversary of their assassination, Zidan considered the "martyrdom of the leaders of victory a great loss that cannot be compensated," adding that "the responsibility of the judiciary in holding accountable those who committed the crime is doubled."
