ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraq’s President Abdul Latif Rashid has filed a lawsuit against Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani and Finance Minister Taif Sami, over the delayed salaries of the Kurdistan Region Government (KRG) civil servants, a presidential aide said on Sunday.
“We want the people of Kurdistan to know that President Rashid has filed a lawsuit at the Iraqi Federal Supreme Court” against the premier and the finance minister, said Hawre Tofiq, the head of the Iraqi presidency's office of relations and international organizations.
The lawsuit, filed on January 20 but only made public on Sunday, urges the federal court to issue a “provisional order” to ensure the KRG employees are “paid continuously and on time.” The presidential aide emphasized that “technical issues should not delay” the salaries of public workers.
Teachers have been protesting outside the United Nations’ office in Sulaimani for nearly two weeks, with some going on a hunger strike for the past 12 days. The protesters’ main demand is the full payment of their December salaries. According to Tofiq, the court’s first hearing on the president’s lawsuit is scheduled for February 14.
Notably, Tofiq’s statement came shortly after striking teachers from Sulaimani flocked to Erbil on Sunday, to protest the KRG’s inconsistent salary disbursements. The protesters demanded a resolution to the ongoing unpaid salaries crisis. Many of them say they are owed salaries that date back years.
The KRG’s interior ministry on Sunday accused “foreign and domestic parties in Iraq” of trying to exploit the protests, confirming that it is in contact with the federal government to address the outstanding salary crisis.
Meanwhile, Erbil Governor Omed Khoshnaw on Sunday accused "ill-intentioned" actors of fueling the protests, stating that it is Baghdad, not Erbil, that is “oppressing” the Kurdistan Region’s civil servants.
The Iraqi federal government and the KRG have held several meetings in recent weeks to discuss amendments to the 2025 federal budget law and resolve the obstacles hindering the payment of civil servant salaries in the Kurdistan Region. The KRG has been working to allocate funds from its share of the federal budget to address the salary shortfalls that have persisted throughout the past year.
The KRG’s hardship notably worsened following the March 2023 suspension of oil exports from the Kurdistan Region through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline. The Iraqi legislature recently passed a bill that allows the resumption of Kurdish oil exports, a move expected to boost Iraq’s income and increase the budget allocated to the Kurdistan Region by Baghdad.