Baghdad – IA – Ahmed Sumaisem
Photography: Wathiq Khuzaei
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The Iraqi Media Network won a number of awards at the Ishtar International Festival for Culture and Arts in its third session, the session of the late artist (Abdul Sattar Al-Basri), which was held on Sunday evening at the Iraqi Hunting Club under the auspices of the Iraqi Media Network, and in the presence of a large number of Iraqi and Arab artists, media professionals and athletes.
The correspondent of the official Iraqi News Agency (INA) said, “The festival honored a number of artists, media figures, athletes, and people of determination, and the Iraqi Media Network won a number of distinguished awards for its dramatic production this year, in addition to a number of the network’s programs receiving awards of honor.” Noting that he “honored the director of drama production at the Iraqi Media Network, Wadih Nader, the editor and director at the network’s Drama Directorate, Marwan Al-Bayati, and the TV presenter on the Iraqi channel, Ahmed Shukri.”
Syrian artist Ayman Zidane said in a statement to the Iraqi News Agency (INA), “When I was invited to attend the Ishtar Festival, I was very happy because I would be in a place that I adore without limits, which is my beloved Iraq.”
He added: “Being honored in the center of Baghdad means a lot to me, even though I have won many awards during my artistic career, when I am honored in Iraq, this is a distinction for me from an ancient country with a civilization that is thousands of years old.”
He expressed his “thank you for the warm reception of the Iraqi public since they set foot on the grounds of Baghdad International Airport.” 
For her part, artist Enas Talib said in a statement to the Iraqi News Agency (INA), “First of all, I thank the presence of the Iraqi News Agency, which is always the first to transmit artistic activities.”
She added: “Everyone knows that through this year’s Ramadan season and through the production of the Iraqi Media Network, it was an exceptional and impressive season in terms of quantity and type of dramatic works that the audience enjoyed, and this in itself is a success under difficult circumstances, and among those circumstances is the time factor, which was a double-edged sword in the process.” Series production.
She pointed out that “the series (Separation), produced by Al-Iraqiya Channel, formed a remarkable and important presence among the Iraqi street, and this is what I learned with specialists about the success of the series and the impact it achieves among other respectable artistic works.”
She explained that “the series touched on the reality of Iraqi society because it put its hand on the wound by dealing with tragic real-life events that may be undeclared.” 
In addition, the artist Haider Munthar said in a statement to the Iraqi News Agency (INA), “I was honored today at the Ishtar Festival for Culture and Arts for all of my artistic works this year, and I received two important awards for my work in the series (Stronger Than Love) and the series (Amerli).” .
He added: “Celebrating the Iraqi artist is an important gesture, especially inside Iraq. The artist deserves an objective evaluation of the work he presented during the year to value his efforts and not to waste them in vain.”
Munthar explained that “he has been preparing for four months to present a popular play written and directed by him entitled (Where Are We Going), which will be a shift in his artistic world at the level of directing and in the horizons of the world of popular theater.”
