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Kurdistan
Senior Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) member Mala Bakhtiar speaks to reporters in Sulaimani on November 14, 2021. Photo: screengrab/Rudaw
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Senior member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) Mala Bakhtiar on Sunday said that he does not accuse anyone of poisoning him and is ready to forgive whoever was involved, following his return to Sulaimani after receiving treatment in a German hospital.
“My door for forgiveness is always open. Believe me, if the criminal approaches me now saying he committed this crime, I promise to forgive him in front of you all,” Bakhtiar told reporters in a press conference in Sulaimani.
Last month, Bakhtiar said that hospitals in Jordan and Germany both confirmed he had been poisoned with mercury. The allegation came after months of infighting within the PUK.
Bakhtiar returned to the Kurdistan Region on Saturday. He was greeted by a jubilant crowd of supporters carrying flowers and banners, and filming him as he waved from his motorcade.
No one has been publicly accused of the poisoning, but Bakhtiar has blamed members of his own party and said he will submit an official request to the politburo to form an investigative committee to look into the case.
“The matter is not Mala Bakhtiar’s alone, the matter is more of an attack against the existence of PUK, the PUK body,” politburo member Saadi Ahmed Pira told Rudaw’s Sangar Abdulrahman on Sunday.
Some have pointed fingers at Lahur Talabany who was expelled from the PUK as its co-chair by his cousin and rival co-chair Bafel Talabani, who later accused his cousin of poisoning him, a charge Lahur Talabany denied. The party’s politburo approved the expulsion of Lahur Talabany earlier this month.
Bafel Talabani has said the shakeup was to end the abuse of party positions such as smuggling and extortion.
Addressing the changes at the top of the PUK, Bakhtiar said it was a "purge" and not "reform."
“Reform to me is a program, a multifaceted change, and restoration of trust. It's self-criticism,” he said.
Updated at 2:46 pm
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