Al-Sharqiya live stream

Al-Sharqiya online television

Al-Sharqiya is an Iraqi satellite channel whose name means the Eastern one. The catalogue records its owner as Saad al-Bazzaz, a Baghdad and Dubai based media figure from Mosul who also edits the newspaper Azzaman. It was Iraq's first privately owned satellite channel: the founder described a large staff aiming at a wide audience through political comedy and the kind of impartial news coverage that had been unheard of in the country for decades. Shia militias used to call it Al-Baathiya, because of al-Bazzaz's ties to the former president - a reminder of how charged the Iraqi media map was when the channel began.

The output mixes current affairs, satire, drama and Iraq's first reality television programmes. The channel's own account states the mix plainly: news, sport, comedy, original Iraqi serials, Arab serials and reality shows, carried on the Arabsat, Nilesat and Hotbird satellites, with live streaming on the internet through the channel website and correspondents reporting from many cities around the world. That combination - a satirical edge beside straight news - is what set the channel apart from the state broadcasters its audience had grown up with.

For viewers, Al-Sharqiya is the Iraqi commercial voice: a private station that has outlasted the upheavals of its home market and still aims at the whole country. Watching needs no subscription and no account, so anyone can watch live at any hour, and this TV Online page carries the same signal. If you want to Watch TV Online Free with Iraq's pioneering private channel, or stream online when the evening satire begins, the Iraq Live Stream keeps Al-Sharqiya on screen.

Al-Sharqiya Watch Live Channel