Sadr stresses equality between components in meeting with PUK

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Muqtada al-Sadr, who led the Sayirun coalition to victory in Iraq’s parliamentary elections, met with a PUK delegation in his Baghdad office on Wednesday. Sadr stressed equality and citizenship.

PUK’s delegation was headed by Mala Bakhtiar, and he was accompanied by politburo, leadership council members and so on, alongside Saadun Faili, the party’s representative in Baghdad.

“His Eminence emphasized the basic principles in the paternalism of the government and the principle of equality between the different sects of the Iraqi people and focusing on the principle of citizenship,” read a statement from Sadr’s office.

PUK’s delegation congratulated Sadr for winning in the Iraqi elections. It did not immediately release a statement.

The group is in Baghdad to meet with the winning lists of the Iraqi election; they have already met with KDP, and have iterated that the position of the president of the republic is the PUK’s right.  

Bakhtiar also met with incumbent Iraqi President Fuad Masum, who is also a PUK politburo member. 

“We will be part of the solution for Kirkuk — Article 140, the issue of Peshmerga, the budget and the constitutional rights of the people of Kurdistan.  The roots and basis of the problems will be discussed and agreed about with the parties that will form the government,” Bakhtiar told party media PUK NOW after the meeting.

Masum hoped that each side will take into consideration the supreme interests of the peoples of Iraq and for the Iraqi constitution to be implemented.

 

The PUK met earlier in the day with the KDP, with the two top Kurdish parties espousing Kurdish unity.