Shafaq News- Najaf

Iraq’s Patriotic Shiite Movement (PSM – formerly Sadrist) leader Muqtada Al-Sadr, on Friday, warned local authorities in Najaf province after a butcher was caught selling wild-boar meat in the province.

In a handwritten Friday sermon, Al-Sadr vowed that "we will not stand by with our hands tied if the local government turns a blind eye to these violations,” calling on merchants across Iraq to seek religious knowledge.

For Muslims, consuming pork is forbidden under Islamic dietary law (haram), based on Quranic verses.

The warning follows the arrest on September 9 of a butcher accused of hunting wild boars and selling the meat to customers as ordinary ground meat. A security source told Shafaq News at the time that an intelligence team had caught the butcher hunting wild boars in a marsh near the Hurriya subdistrict of Kufa, and selling the meat at a shop in central Najaf as ordinary minced meat.

Following the incident, Al-Sadr had called for tighter oversight of markets in Najaf province. In a social media post, he described Najaf as "the capital of Shiite Islam worldwide," saying the city must not be tarnished by conduct that violates religious and health standards, particularly in its markets.

On Monday, September 14, the Najaf Criminal Court sentenced a man convicted of selling pork in the province to ten years in prison, a judicial source said. The case had drawn significant public attention in recent days.