Kurdistan Region president meets new Kurdish UK education secretary

"Kurdistan will greatly benefit from UK's successful experiences" in developing the education sector.

Kurdistan 24 2021/09/17 20:40

Kurdistan Region President Nechirvan Barzani (R) met UK Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi in London on Sept. 17, 2021. (Photo: Kurdistan Presidency Office)

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Kurdistan Region President Nechirvan Barzani on Friday met in London with Nadhim Zahawi, an ethnic Kurd who was recently appointed as the United Kingdom's Secretary of State for Education.

The group of Kurdish politicians arrived in the UK capital on Wednesday for a three-day visit, Barzani had met with a number of high-level officials, including the foreign and defense secretaries.

"Kurdistan will greatly benefit from UK's successful experiences in developing [the] education sector," said the Kurdistan Region Head of Department of Foreign Relations, Safeen Dizayee, in a tweet about the meeting.

.@IKRPresident met w/ new Secretary of Education @nadhimzahawi at @educationgovuk. #Kurdistan will greatly benefit from UK's successful experiences in developing education sector as we prepare future generations. We highly value Mr Zahawi's efforts & achievements as British-Kurd. pic.twitter.com/ZSC557UyNC
— Safeen Dizayee (@SafeenDizayee) September 17, 2021

The president congratulated Zahawi on his appointment and wished him success, a statement from Barzani's office read. It added that Secretary Zahawi affirmed the UK's readiness to support the Kurdistan Region and Iraq in the education sector.

The officials also discussed the latest developments in the Middle East, the statement concluded.

Nadhim Zahawi was born in Baghdad to Kurdish parents who fled to the UK to escape the brutal dictatorship of Saddam Hussein in 1978, when Zahawi was nine years old, according to his parliamentary biography.