President Masoud Barzani received a Turkish diplomatic delegation headed by Mr. Mevlut Cavusoglu, the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Mr. Cavusoglu conveyed the greetings of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to President Barzani and congratulated the President and the Peshmerga forces for their crucial role in the liberation of Mosul.
The two sides spoke of the bilateral relations between Turkey and the Kurdistan Region, which are of immediate mutual benefit to the people of Turkey and the Kurdistan Region, and they stated that the great relations between the two sides will only grow stronger.
President Barzani and Mr. Cavusoglu also discussed the Kurdistan Independence Referendum of September 25. The Turkish Foreign Minister acknowledged that such a step is a natural right of the people of the Kurdistan Region, however, the timing may cause more issues in the region. He added that Turkey is willing to partake in helping with the negotiations between Baghdad and Erbil so that some of the grievances of the Kurdistan Region can be resolved.
President Barzani reiterated the position of the Kurdistan Region and how decades of attempting to form an Iraq where the people of Kurdistan can feel as real partners have failed. He added that despite brutal crimes committed by the successive Iraqi regimes, including the use of chemical weapons, genocide and denial of all political rights, the Kurdish leadership did participate in the formation of the new Iraq after the 2003 US-led intervention. That too, President Barzani said has failed. The President added that conducting a referendum is a democratic right of the people of the Kurdistan Region and reassured Mr. Cavusoglu that such a step would not negatively impact the collective effort to exterminate the terrorists of the Islamic State.
published 24 August 2017