Iraqi Kurds voted yesterday in elections expected to keep President Masoud Barzani in power in Kurdistan, but unlikely to erase voter concern about corruption or end a bitter feud with Baghdad over land and oil.
Polls opened at 8am in the largely autonomous northern region, and closed at 6pm, after which ballots were to be flown to Baghdad for tallying. The official count is expected to take two to three days with no challenges.
The people of the relatively peaceful enclave will elect a president directly this time, unlike 2005 polls that selected a parliament alone, and former guerrilla leader Barzani looks certain to defeat his five competitors.
Barzani’s Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani’s Democratic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), the region’s most powerful parties, will run for seats on a joint list against 23 alliances of smaller parties.
As the poll drew near, Barzani and other Kurdish leaders churned out fiery rhetoric about claims to territories they dispute with Baghdad’s Arab-led government.
Diplomats see the row over oil-producing Kirkuk and other disputed areas as a major threat to Iraq’s long-term stability as sectarian violence fades, but many Kurds support Barzani’s hardline approach against Baghdad, from where Saddam Hussein launched deadly attacks against Kurds in the 1980s.
“Kirkuk is the most important thing to Kurds,” said Yunis Mohammed Qader, 39, outside the sweltering oven of his pizza takeaway. “Only Barzani and the KDP-PUK can bring it back.”
The Kurd-Arab row has held up critical energy legislation in the national parliament and overshadows government efforts to secure foreign investment in the important oil sector.
Speaking to reporters after voting, Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani, the president’s nephew, signaled that the Kurd leader might take a different tack after the elections.
“We hope after the election we will be able to sit down at the negotiating table with Baghdad and resolve the issue of Kirkuk ... We Kurds are willing to show flexibility,” he said.
Although Kurds have long dreamed of their own state and such rallying cries used to define Kurdish politics, many Kurds now worry more about problems closer to home, like graft.
Critics of the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) accuse it of widespread official corruption, abuses by security forces, media intimidation and an atmosphere that stifles dissent.
“They feed on our money. They point to buildings and say it’s development, but do you think most Kurds can go in that hotel,” bar worker Haider Abdul asked of Kurdish leaders, pointing at a fancy Arbil hotel in the distance.
An alliance hoping to capitalize on disenchantment is the Change list, run by independent candidate Noshwan Mustafa.
While the polls are not expected to topple the region’s two-party hegemony, Change officials hope for up to a third of the 111 seats in the Kurdish parliament.
“Our priority is to clean up the system and give it back to the people,” said Safin Malaqara, head of the Change campaign in Arbil. “The ruling parties haven’t put any oversight in place on the region’s budget. God knows where all that money goes.”
Sensitive to these criticisms, Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Barham Salih, who heads the campaign of the joint KDP-PUK list, has made transparency and accountability a campaign priority.
Former Nicaraguan president Violeta Chamorro, who brought peace to Nicaragua after years of war and was the first woman elected president in the Americas, died on Saturday at the age of 95, her family said. Chamorro, who ruled the poor Central American country from 1990 to 1997, “died in peace, surrounded by the affection and love of her children,” said a statement issued by her four children. As president, Chamorro ended a civil war that had raged for much of the 1980s as US-backed rebels known as the “Contras” fought the leftist Sandinista government. That conflict made Nicaragua one of
COMPETITION: The US and Russia make up about 90 percent of the world stockpile and are adding new versions, while China’s nuclear force is steadily rising, SIPRI said Most of the world’s nuclear-armed states continued to modernize their arsenals last year, setting the stage for a new nuclear arms race, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said yesterday. Nuclear powers including the US and Russia — which account for about 90 percent of the world’s stockpile — had spent time last year “upgrading existing weapons and adding newer versions,” researchers said. Since the end of the Cold War, old warheads have generally been dismantled quicker than new ones have been deployed, resulting in a decrease in the overall number of warheads. However, SIPRI said that the trend was likely
BOMBARDMENT: Moscow sent more than 440 drones and 32 missiles, Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, in ‘one of the most terrifying strikes’ on the capital in recent months A nighttime Russian missile and drone bombardment of Ukraine killed at least 15 people and injured 116 while they slept in their homes, local officials said yesterday, with the main barrage centering on the capital, Kyiv. Kyiv City Military Administration head Tymur Tkachenko said 14 people were killed and 99 were injured as explosions echoed across the city for hours during the night. The bombardment demolished a nine-story residential building, destroying dozens of apartments. Emergency workers were at the scene to rescue people from under the rubble. Russia flung more than 440 drones and 32 missiles at Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy
Indonesia’s Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki yesterday erupted again with giant ash and smoke plumes after forcing evacuations of villages and flight cancelations, including to and from the resort island of Bali. Several eruptions sent ash up to 5km into the sky on Tuesday evening to yesterday afternoon. An eruption on Tuesday afternoon sent thick, gray clouds 10km into the sky that expanded into a mushroom-shaped ash cloud visible as much as 150km kilometers away. The eruption alert was raised on Tuesday to the highest level and the danger zone where people are recommended to leave was expanded to 8km from the crater. Officers also
RSS