Shafaq News- Baghdad (Updated at 14:01)

The Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), a state security organization that includes Iran-aligned factions, said on Monday that Iraq's government had requested an official funeral procession for Iran's late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

Speaking at a PMF meeting, Muhannad Al-Aqabi, director of the PMF's General Directorate of Media, described the procession as an official event that would be held in coordination with political forces and organized with the participation of relevant state institutions.

The Iraqi government spokesman Haider al-Aboudi said in a press conference that Iraq has approved a request from Iran to hold the official funeral procession for Iran's Khamenei on July 8.

Iranian FM is currently in Baghdad for a one-day visit, which includes official talks about preparations for the funeral procession.

Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader from 1989 until his death, was killed on February 28 during the opening day of US-Israeli airstrikes on Iran. Tehran has announced funeral ceremonies beginning in the Iranian capital on July 4, followed by Qom on July 7, Iraq on July 8, and burial in Mashhad on July 9.

The Iraq leg of the procession is scheduled to begin in Najaf before moving to the Imam Ali shrine, one of Shia Islam's holiest sites, and then to Karbala, home to the shrines of Imam Hussein and Abbas ibn Ali, two other central figures in Shia religious history.