KDP leader says will not participate in elections without minorities
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Masoud Barzani, leader of the ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), on Thursday reiterated that his party will not take part in the Kurdistan Region’s upcoming elections unless quota minorities quota seats are restored.
“We will not take part in the elections without the participation of the minorities because depriving the minorities [of quota seats] is a threat to the historical values of our nation,” Barzani told a Christian delegation headed by Patriarch Mar Awa Royel of the Assyrian Church of the East, according to a statement from his office.
The Kurdistan Region is set to hold parliamentary elections on June 10, with a nearly two-year delay, after multiple postponements caused by disputes between political parties and pending legal cases related to the electoral process.
Although the majority of the Kurdistan Region’s political parties, including KDP’s power-sharer in government, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), announced their participation in the vote, the KDP remains set in its choice to boycott the election, despite numerous calls to reverse this decision. The party claims a recent ruling by the federal court on the minority seats and the division of the Region into four constituencies is “unconstitutional.”
“We will not take part in the elections without the participation of the minorities because depriving the minorities [of quota seats] is a threat to the historical values of our nation,” Barzani told a Christian delegation headed by Patriarch Mar Awa Royel of the Assyrian Church of the East, according to a statement from his office.
The Kurdistan Region is set to hold parliamentary elections on June 10, with a nearly two-year delay, after multiple postponements caused by disputes between political parties and pending legal cases related to the electoral process.
Although the majority of the Kurdistan Region’s political parties, including KDP’s power-sharer in government, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), announced their participation in the vote, the KDP remains set in its choice to boycott the election, despite numerous calls to reverse this decision. The party claims a recent ruling by the federal court on the minority seats and the division of the Region into four constituencies is “unconstitutional.”