Iraq’s Kurdish parliament backs independence referendum
ERBIL, Iraq: The parliament of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region approved a plan on Friday to hold a referendum on independence on September 25, ignoring opposition from Baghdad and the wider region as well as Western concerns that the vote could spark fresh conflict.
Parliament reconvened in Erbil, the seat of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq, where an overwhelming majority of the Kurdish lawmakers taking part backed the plan.
Hours after the decision, the White House publicly called for the first time on the KRG to cancel the referendum, warning that the vote was “distracting from efforts to defeat IS and stabilise the liberated areas.”
“The United States does not support the Kurdistan Regional Government’s intention to hold a referendum later this month,” the White House said in a statement.
It urged the KRG to “enter into serious and sustained dialogue with Baghdad, which the United States has repeatedly indicated it is prepared to facilitate.”
The regional parliament’s decision came despite an intense diplomatic drive by the United States, which has provided critical military aid to the KRG’s fight against IS, to persuade the Kurdish leadership to cancel the referendum. The parliament session was the first held since the legislature was suspended nearly two years ago, though only 68 of 111 lawmakers attended due to a boycott by the main opposition movement Gorran.
“We’ve been waiting more than 100 years for this,” Omed Khoshnaw, a lawmaker from the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDR) of KRG President Massoud Barzani, said.
“There is no other way to guarantee that genocide will never be repeated,” Khoshnaw told the assembly earlier, referring to the persecution of the Kurds and their expulsion from areas such as oil-rich Kirkuk under Iraqi ruler Saddam Hussein.
The Baghdad parliament’s decision earlier last week to oppose the referendum drew condemnation from deputies in Erbil.
“We refuse to accept the parliament’s decision, which unlawful,” Muna Qahwachi, Turkman lawmaker, said.
Qahwachi said she had voted in favour of the referendum because late Iraqi was a she said Turkmen were protected in Kurdistan, unlike in the rest of Iraq.
Iraq’s neighbours Iran and Turkey also oppose the plebiscite, fearing an independent Kurdish state could fuel separatism among their own Kurdish populations. The opposition Gorran movement boycotted last Friday’s parliamentary session, the first since a dispute between them and Barzani’s KDP caused the suspension of the assembly in 2015.