Hemin Hawrami, senior assistant to Kurdish President Masoud Barzani, tweeted on Monday that the "Kurdistan election commission ratified and approved the referendum held on [September 25], parliament and presidential elections on [November 1]."
The referendum date was initially announced in early June at a meeting attended by President Barzani and most political parties in the region.
In July, Barzani announced November 1 as the day for parliamentary and presidential elections for the Kurdistan Region.
Hawrami called this a "Big step" in his tweet on Monday.
The Kurdistan Region last held parliamentary elections in 2013. The presidential election has not been held since 2009.
Barzani, who won the 2009 vote with a landslide, has already said that he will not stand in the November elections.
His term of office expired in 2013 and has since been extended twice, once by the Kurdistan parliament and then in a controversial court decision.
Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) won 38 seats in 2013, followed by the Gorran (Change) Movement with 24 seats, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) with 18, the Kurdistan Islamic Union (KIU) with 10, and the Kurdistan Islamic Group (Komal) with 6.
Kurdistan's Independent High Electoral and Referendum Commission (IHERC) is overseeing the referendum and elections.
The election commission told Rudaw it will have a press conference later on Monday.
