Envoy points to Quebecers in describing Kurds’ plight
‘AMICABLE DIVORCE’
• A senior representative for Iraq’s Kurdish region is defending her people’s plan to hold a referendum on independence, saying they simply want to exercise the same right to self- determination as Quebecers.
Tensions in Ir aq are mounting after the country’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan regional government in Erbil announced plans to hold the long- promised referendum on Sept. 25.
Planning is now underway despite fierce objections from Iraq’s central government in Baghdad, as well as varying degrees of opposition from the U.S., the European Union and most of Iraq’s neighbours.
Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman, the Kurdish government’s top diplomat in Washington, said her people have tried to live and work with the rest of Iraq, but Baghdad has chosen not to co-operate.
“We have done our best to be partners in Iraq; it has not worked,” Rahman said. “We believe this is the right time to allow the people of Kurdistan to exercise their democratic right ... to express their self-determination.”
Canada has said l i ttle about the planned referendum, despite the fact Canadian soldiers have partnered almost exclusively with the Kurdish peshmerga in the fight against ISIL.
Asked about the i ssue last week, Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan said: “A unified Iraq is what we believe is the long-term solution, but ultimately these decisions have to be made by the Iraqi people, and the Kurds themselves.”
Rahman linked Canada’s reticence to weigh in on Kurdistan’s aspirations for independence to the fact it offers an uncomfortable echo of the on-again, off-again debate on Quebec sovereignty.
“As a state that has its own province of Quebec that has exercised the right to hold a referendum, I think it would be difficult for Canada to deny that right to the people of Kurdistan,” she said.
Yet she also cautioned against comparisons, calling Iraq’s situation “a different kettle of fish” because of the tense relationship between Erbil and Baghdad.
“Ottawa would never think to cut off the medicine supply to one of its provinces, even if it was a province that was a thorn in its side,” she said. “We’re trying to have an amicable divorce from Iraq, but this is not the same as Quebec having an amicable divorce from Canada.”