Barzani’s words galvanized the city of Sulaimani immediately. His words were instantly presented on media outlets and social networks as Barzani having a personal problem with Maliki, and as the question of independence being a matter of mere words and contingent on Maliki’s returning to power.
The people who presented Barzani’s words as having those connotations didn’t understand or didn’t want to understand that he, in his interview, was talking about the declaration of independence in a peaceful manner in agreement with Baghdad. This is what the international community wants, and this way prevents further bloodshed which is not possible with Maliki in power.
Moreover, Barzani doesn’t want the question of independence to be decided unilaterally within the Kurdistan Region. Rather, he wants independence to be regarded as a national project. It is very good if independence can be achieved through reaching an agreement, otherwise it can be attained it through holding a referendum.
There is a reason behind Barzani’s broaching this subject at this particular time. Maliki’s returning to power in Baghdad is a regional and international question. He wants to make a comeback to his previous throne by virtue of public support from Iran and some Kurdish political parties like the Islamic Group, Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), Democratic Union Party (PYD), a group within the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Change Movement (Gorran).
The Turkish Prime Minister, Binali Yıldırım’s visit to Baghdad was a show of support to the incumbent Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi. The Sunni countries are against Maliki’s comeback to power, too.
Barzani is well-aware of Maliki’s political endeavors. In his interview, Barzani conveyed two messages. First, he disappointed Kurdish political parties of Maliki’s return to power, telling them to peacefully participate in the process of declaring independence, or he will declare independence unilaterally and take responsibility for doing so himself. Second, he put a limit on Iranian interventions.
Why should I vote for Gorran party?
The Change Movement (Gorran) is, on the one hand, currently engaged with strategic preparations for the next general elections. It is highly likely that they will participate in the elections alone, without forming any alliances with the PUK. On the other hand, they are mourning the death of the strategic pact they had signed earlier with the PUK, complaining about the recent bonding between the PUK and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP).
The agreement with the PUK was Gorran’s third pact. They had previously allied with Islamic parties once and had a power-sharing agreement with the KDP, too. All three alliances failed, and the Gorran party now wants to convince its fans and members that they were not a failure, rather political treacheries.
The reason behind the failure of Gorran’s strategic alliance with the PUK is ostensibly a splinter group within the PUK which works to derail this bilateral treaty. But this is a flimsy pretext for the pact not to succeed. The group apparently responsible for the failure of this agreement does not hold much power within the PUK, nor does it hold the party’s riches. Rather, it is the group which earlier got the Gorran party to sign a tactical treaty and now wants to reach an agreement with the KDP.
The Change Movement is facing very big challenges ahead of the elections, although it unclear whether or not they will be held on time. One of these challenges is how to convince people to vote for them. Will they be talking about their days as the opposition or their tenure in the cabinet? How will they explain their political and administrative alliances to their people? What can they promise people, when PUK’s 18 parliamentary seats on the ground have more influence than Gorran’s 24 seats in the parliament of the Kurdistan Region?
What did the PKK achieve?
The duties of the PKK to protect western Kurdistan are gradually coming to an end. The exclusion of the PYD from the recent Astana peace talks is apparently partly attributed to the Turkish government. But, it was also because there are close relations and some sort of alliances among the PKK, Iran and Syria. That is why the PYD presence in those talks was deemed unimportant. In the middle of 2011, the PKK met with the Syrian delegation in Qandil to design their joint agenda for Syria. There are certain things which have already been decided.
Russia reportedly has talked about autonomy for Syrian Kurds – something which the spokesperson of the Russian foreign ministry has denied discussing. But given that this was discussed, is autonomy the deserved right of the Kurdish nation in Syria? The PKK wanted to make people and political parties leave western Kurdistan. The PKK did what it was assigned to do. The people of western Kurdistan consequently will fail to realize their dream of an independent state and unifying with the Kurdistan Region. This is apparently an achievement for the PKK.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rudaw.
