Minnesota town adopts sister city in Kurdistan Region

On Monday, the small Minnesota city of Duluth, two and a half hours north of Minneapolis, became a ‘sister’ city for the fifth time.

Duluth Sister Cities International (DSCI) signed the legal agreement with Rania, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq at Duluth City Hall. Importantly, this is Duluth’s first sister city in 24 years. Rania is the first Middle Eastern city Duluth has chosen for its partnership.

Located in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, the cities’ population is roughly 100,000 and is surrounded by mountains, rivers and lakes. Its economy is largely based on agriculture, oil refining and mining, as well as livestock, including sheep, goats, cows and bee-keeping. Rania is an ancient city, whose history can be traced to the eighth-century BCE.

Additionally, Rania and Duluth have shared several years of “unofficial” partnership prior to this latest agreement.

The friendship first began in 2007, when Michele Naar-Obed from Duluth was working in the Kurdistan Region and established a connection with the Rania Youth Center. After learning about the possibilities of sister city exchanges, she spoke with the Duluth Sister Cities International (DSCI) Board of Directors and submitted a proposal to strengthen relations between the two cities.

Duluth has four other sister cities, including Isumi-shi, Japan; Vaxjo, Sweden; Thunder Bay, Canada; and Petrozavodsk, Russia.

Since 2009, three Duluth delegations traveled to Rania, while two Rania delegations visited Duluth. In 2013, over 20 members of Duluth’s Echoes of Peace Choir visited Rania and, upon their return, Mayor Don Ness, and the City Council approved entering into a formal Sister City relationship.

Last year, the Royal D. Alworth Institute for International Studies at UMD hosted a visiting professor from Rania and in return, the Rania Sister City Committee is making plans for a delegation of Duluth-based educators to travel to Rania.

The recent agreement was signed by Mayor Ness and with Hiwa Qarani, the mayor of Rania, who appeared via Skype. The overall objective is that Duluth will gain a more enriching understanding of Kurds and Kurdistan.

Duluth is also looking to its southern neighbor, Minneapolis for ideas on how to build a successful program since Minneapolis maintains a strong relationship with its sister city in Najaf, Iraq. DSCI is working on setting up a joint Duluth-Rania and Minneapolis-Najaf meeting and delegation visit to help break down barriers and aid American-Middle Eastern cultural and political understanding.

Although Duluth lacks a large Kurdish population, nearby Fargo, North Dakota is home to over 1,000 Kurdish-Americans, DSCI hopes to invite their Fargo neighbors to become involved with the new Duluth-Rania partnership as well.

To showcase the friendship and shared commonalities, a daffodil garden was planted in the Sister City Park in Lake Place Park. These dynamic and resilient flowers are associated with the Kurdish New Year (Newroz) celebrations, which now also stands as a symbol of the “blossoming” connections between both cities and peoples.