Iraq officials must 'step up' to enact reforms: UN envoy

Iraqi officials must ramp up their response to mass demonstrations demanding an overhaul of the political system, the UN representative in Baghdad told AFP in an exclusive interview Wednesday.

Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, who heads the UN's Iraq mission (UNAMI), said the country's authorities must "step up to the plate and make things happen".

"They are elected by the people, they are accountable to them," she said.

Protests broke out in Baghdad and the country's Shiite-majority south in early October over rampant corruption, lack of jobs and notoriously poor services. One in five people lives below the poverty line, despite the vast oil wealth of OPEC's second biggest producer.

The United Nations has proposed a phased roadmap that, in a crucial step, was endorsed by Iraq's top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani after meeting Hennis-Plasschaert.

It calls for an immediate end to violence, electoral reform and anti-graft measures within two weeks followed by constitutional amendments and infrastructure legislation within three months.

Hennis-Plasschaert discussed the plan with lawmakers on the sidelines of a parliamentary session on Wednesday, telling them: "Now is the time to act, otherwise any momentum will be lost -- lost at a time when many, many Iraqis demand concrete results."