Election officials in Iraqi Kurdistan have announced that they intend to hold both presidential and parliamentary votes for the region on November 1, aiming to bolster the government after last week’s referendum on secession from Iraq.
Kurdistan voted overwhelmingly in favor of secession, with over 92% yes votes on heavy turnout. Iraqi officials have vowed to bring the Kurds back under control, and has been supported by Turkey and Iran in possible military action against them.
Iraq has already closed Kurdistan’s airports and is in the process of seizing their border crossings. The Iraqi central bank today announced new financial sanctions, including a full stop of all foreign currency transfers into Kurdish banks.
As far as the election goes, President Barzani is a real question mark, as Kurdish law restricts him to two terms in office, and he’s already on his third term, extending it because of the ISIS war. Given the overwhelming support for secession, it’s safe to say that’s a winning issue virtually all major Kurdish politicians will be emphasizing.
So are with our allies, Turkey and Iraq, and our mortal enemy Iran on this one? Or are we going to go against fellow NATO member Turkey, our ally Iraq and our mortal enemy Iran on this one? The mess keeps getting messier. Oh and there’s that pesky thing about North Korea festering. GTFO.
Seeing as how Israel is eyeballs deep in this and taking into account the Ayatollah’s recent comment equating the creation of a Kurdish state with the creation of the modern state of Israel, I don’t think it’s too far fetched to say that Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and probably Syria will react militarily. Maybe that’s what the Israelis are hoping for…to drag the US into a war defending Israeli actions.
There is zero comparison between Israel and Kurdistan. The Zionists were an invading force from a separate continent. The Kurds have always been there and are demanding nothing less than control of the ground they stand on. I’m sure Israel is supporting the Kurds to stir the pot with the Shiites but that doesn’t make the Kurds demands for independence any less valid than the Palestinians.
I don’t think you understand the region at all or Israel’s involvement there for decades, cultivating this group of Kurds. It would be as if someone got a large group of Hillbillies to declare Appalachia their home and demand secession from the US. Just like the Hillbillies, the Kurds are run by a bunch of good ole boys and their clique of Boss Hawgs and Roscoe P Coltranes.
Barzani is filthy as hell, I won’t argue you on that, but the Kurdish independence movement is older than him, his father or the nation of Israel for that matter. The Kurds are the largest unrepresented population on the planet. Their Independence was inevitable. The best we can do is support the opposition to the Israel friendly Kurds like Barzani. Groups connected to Abdullah Ocalan and his anarchist KCK are our best bet. They don’t even believe in borders.
P.S. I’m not exactly a Hillbilly but I do live in the foothills of Appalachia in Central Pennsylvania and if Putin offered me a few Rubles to secede from this Trump-f**ked nation I might just take him up on that. I’m a strong supporter of succession. Kurdistan? Catalonia? Puerto Rico? Appalachia? F**k it! Why not? The smaller a country is, the more accessible it is to its people and the less capable it is of waging war.
It began here: Hillbilly Jihad and the Bubba Liberation Front under the stalwart leadership of Billy Badass
That’s WILLIAM Badass to you lickbag.
The Kurdistan Democratic Solution Party will likely be the only truly democratic option but Barzani will likely go out of his way to suppress them again. Two steps forward, one step back. Viva Rojava.
Well, if the Kurds, who are an over 30-million strong nation and have been fighting for their own state for over a century, don’t deserve independence, then no nation deserves independence, particularly the US. Martin
Jay and others like him may write whatever they want to write, but these critics of the Kurds will never understand a people’s passion for freedom.
Fortunately, the Kurds couldn’t care less what he, or those like him, Escobar or Blondet, are barking. Kurdistan is a historical necessity: it’s only a matter of time now. Russia has made a mistake by not supporting Barzani or at least by not remaining silent.
It’s very disappointing because Russia once helped establish a small, independent Kurdish Republic, Mahabat. Tied up in Syria, which is also
very sensitive about Kurdish independence, Russia could have diplomatically stayed out of the fray. But it did not and, which is much worse, is now prepared to sell its modern, lethal tanks to the Iraqi government, the Kurds’ worst enemy.
In this situation, where the Kurds are surrounded by enraged enemies, is it any wonder that they want to turn to Israel, the only country ready to offer help? If you are desperate for freedom, you do not choose friends: you accept whatever friends you can find.