Council Head calls on Kurdish leaders to defend Kurdistan flag case in Kirkuk

KIRKUK, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) – A council of Kurdish leaders to defend the hoisting of the Kurdistan flag in public institutions in Kirkuk must be established to acknowledge the tremendous moral support the move has received from Kurds around the world, a Kurdish official said on Tuesday.

The head of Kirkuk Provincial Council (KPC) Rebwar Talabani in a press conference said his court hearing regarding the raising of the Kurdistan flag over Kirkuk's public institutions had been postponed until Aug. 2.

In late March 2017, by majority-vote, the KPC elected to raise the Kurdistan flag alongside the Iraqi one over all government offices. Following the decision, local Turkmen issued a lawsuit in the Iraqi federal court in Baghdad against Talabani.

Talabani has maintained the decision was constitutional, and that since Kirkuk is one of the disputed territories between the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and the federal government of Iraq, it requires the presence of both sides' flags until the political future of the province is determined.

“I will send an official letter regarding the hoisting of the Kurdistan flag in Kirkuk to the President and the Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Region, Kurdish political parties and their representatives in the Parliament of Iraq and ask them to get involved and support the move,” Talabani added.

“We have no problem with the lawsuit if it does not go beyond the legal and constitutional framework,” he continued. “However, a council should be established, with the supervision of those I will reach out to, to defend the case of the Kurdistan flag in Kirkuk.”

He stated that since they decided to raise the Kurdistan flag on all government buildings, he has received enormous moral support from Kurds around the world, including local Turkmen in Kirkuk.

“We should translate this support into a practical agenda to support the Kurdistan flag flying in Kirkuk,” the Kurdish official concluded.

Kurds view the decision as a “historical” vote to link the appropriated Kurdish-majority province back to the Kurdistan Region.

The oil-rich province is located in the south of the Kurdistan Region and north of Iraq.

Although Kurds make up a majority of the population, Kirkuk is a multicultural region, rich in ethnic and religious backgrounds including Turkmen, Arabs, and Christians.

Following the emergence of the Islamic State (IS) mid-2014, the Iraqi army fled Kirkuk and failed to protect the province from the jihadist group despite being well-armed, with heavy weapons and artilleries.

Since then, the Kurdish Peshmerga forces have been in charge of protecting the people of Kirkuk, regardless of their different ethnic and religious backgrounds, from the threat of IS.

Kirkuk in the past century has gone through several Arabization processes at the hands of Iraqi governments aiming to alter demographics and deny the area is a part of the Kurdistan Region.

The Kurdistan Region has scheduled an independence referendum for Sep. 25. The disputed territories will also be included in the vote, where they will decide whether to be a part of an independent Kurdish state or not.

Editing by G.H. Renaud