ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani congratulated Donald Trump on winning the US presidency, as he noted that the elections coincided with the ongoing battle for Mosul.
Meanwhile, Kurdish President Masoud Barzani also congratulated America’s next president, while calling on him to support Kurdish rights.
“We hope that your support and our alliance continue and grow even stronger,” the president said. “The Kurdistan nation is expecting full support from you to achieve its rightful rights," he added in a statement.
In his comments the Kurdish prime minister said that Iraq’s Kurds feel encouraged at the admiration expressed by Trump in the past, saying he hoped to soon see the president-elect in Kurdistan.
The elections coincided with “intense operations around Mosul,” where the Kurdish Peshmerga and Iraqi forces have launched the largest operations since the 2003 Iraq war to retake the city of Mosul from the Islamic State, the prime minister noted.
“Our people are encouraged that the President-elect has previously expressed his admiration and support for our people and the Peshmerga,” a statement from the prime minister’s office said.
“We stand ready to work even more closely together, and look forward to welcoming the President-elect here in the future,” he added.
Trump has expressed his admiration for the Kurds on more than one occasion, and had openly supported arming the Kurds in their fight against ISIS.
In August 2015 when he visited Nashville, Tennessee where there is a large Kurdish population, he said the US should support the Kurds even more.
“We should be using the Kurdish, we should be arming the Kurdish, They have proven to be the best fighters,” Trump said in Tennessee. “They have really proven the most loyal to us. And as far as I am concerned I did not the Nashville has a large Kurdish population, but I will tell you we should be using and utilizing those people, they have great heart. They are great fighters, and we should be working with them much more so than we work (now),” he added.
But last year Trump also caused controversy in the Kurdistan Region when he praised the use of chemical weapon by Saddam Hussein against the Kurds in 1988.
In comments in late December, he argued that while the ousted Iraqi dictator might have been a “bad guy,” he at least “killed terrorists.” He also lamented the fact that people “went crazy” when Hussein threw around “a little gas.”
That was a clear reference to Hussein’s use of poison gas during the closing weeks of the 1980-88 war with Iran and during his so-called Anfal campaign of the same decade.
That campaign killed at least 180,000 Kurds, including the infamous killing of 5,000 people with chemical bombs in the Kurdish town of Halabja.
In August, the government of Halabja wrote a letter to Trump, denouncing his “obnoxious statements.” The Halabja Governorate demanded an apology from the then presidential nominee.
.jpeg&w=3840&q=75)
