• About Us
  • Who Are We
  • Work With Us
Saturday, February 27, 2021
No Result
View All Result
NEWSLETTER
The Globe Post
39 °f
New York
44 ° Fri
46 ° Sat
40 ° Sun
41 ° Mon
No Result
View All Result
The Globe Post
No Result
View All Result
Home Dont Miss

US May Cut Ties With Peshmerga if Kurdistan Referendum Goes Ahead

Joanne Stocker by Joanne Stocker
09/15/17
in Dont Miss, Featured, Middle East
McGurk, Kurdistan referendum, Barzani, KRG, Kurdistan, US Coalition peshmerga

US Envoy Brett McGurk and Kurdistan Regional Government President Masoud Barzani meet in Erbil in July 2017. Image: KRG/Twitter

Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

The United States is seeking to postpone the upcoming Iraqi Kurdistan referendum and may end ties with the region, including the Peshmerga forces, if the independence vote goes ahead, according to an official with one of the autonomous region’s political parties.

“If the referendum will take place, the United States might cut all diplomatic, military and economic ties with the Kurds,” Shunas Sherko Jdy, an official with the Gorran (Change) party’s diplomatic relations department, told The Globe Post on Wednesday.

“This is what we have been told. The kind of support they didn’t say clearly, but diplomatically it means that. They are going to, you know, ‘rearrange the kind of help you have gotten from the US,’ because the priority for the United States at this moment is fighting ISIS.”

The Peshmerga are a major partner in the U.S. Coalition operations to oust ISIS from Iraq. The force took heavy losses in the Mosul campaign, and Washington paid the Peshmerga’s salaries when the KRG was unable to.

Mr. Sherko Jdy and other members of Gorran, one of the main parties in opposition to the ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party, met on Wednesday with Brett McGurk, the U.S. Envoy to the Coalition against ISIS, in Erbil.

Gorran is in favor of a referendum to determine Iraqi Kurdistan’s future independence, but has opposed the timing of the September 25 vote, which the party maintains was determined by KDP leader and Kurdistan Regional Government President Masoud Barzani.

“From the beginning we have stated the date of the referendum was a problem,” Mr. Sherko Jdy stressed. “It was one person who decided it. We are not against Kurdish independence but we think Mr. Barzani wants to do the referendum [now] to cover up the chaos that has been happening.”

The Kurdistan Region remains in financial distress and many of its public servants have not been paid in months. Parliament was suspended in 2015 when speaker Yousif Mohammed – a Gorran member – was prevented from entering Erbil. It is scheduled to reconvene on Thursday but Mr. Sherko Jdy said Gorran MPs and Speaker Mustafa will not be in attendance.

Prompted in part by disputes with the Iraqi government over the border and budget, the KDP maintains that independence is necessary as Baghdad has not fulfilled its constitutional obligations to the Kurdistan Region.

“We do not support the planned September 25 referendum on Kurdish independence. The United States has made its opposition clear since the KRG announced the planned referendum,” a U.S. State Department spokesperson told The Globe Post.

The State Department declined to elaborate on Mr. McGurk’s meetings with the Kurdish parties, saying that they were part of his regular consolation on the anti-ISIS effort.

“In his meetings, he will emphasize the need to remain focused on the threat ISIS still poses to Iraq and the region and the importance of strong coordination for ongoing humanitarian and stabilization efforts to ensure ISIS does not return to liberated areas,” the spokesperson said.

Mr. McGurk met with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Abadi on Tuesday, leaders of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party on Wednesday and is expected to meet other Iraqi and KRG leaders this week. Media reports have suggested that the U.S. is pushing Mr. Barzani to delay the referendum until after the Iraqi parliamentary elections next year.

The State Department has maintained that the timing of the referendum would distract from the ISIS fight. Mr. Sherko Jdy said Mr. McGurk made it clear “the U.S. is totally against the referendum, and they think if it takes place it will be a catastrophe to the region.”

ShareTweet
Joanne Stocker

Joanne Stocker

Related Posts

A Kurd holds up a flag saying 'Kurdistan'
Opinion

Kurds and Turkish-Cypriots: Shared Destiny, Common Struggle

by Ferran Taberner
October 17, 2018
An Iraqi voter in Baghdad
Opinion

Why is US Leaving the Kurdistan Region of Iraq to Iranians?

by Hemn Baqir Abdul
June 22, 2018
An Iraqi at a polling station
Opinion

The May 12 Parliamentary Election in Iraq Was Botched

by Heyrsh Abdulrahman
June 6, 2018
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Abadi. On Thursday, he rejected an offer by regional officials to freeze the results of the Kurdistan referendum.
Featured

Iraqi Prime Minister Takes Election Campaign to Kurdish Capital

by Staff Writer
April 26, 2018
Iraqi Kurdistan protest
Middle East

New Protests in Iraqi Kurdistan as Residents Seethe at Authorities

by Staff Writer with AFP
December 22, 2017
Iraqi Kurdistan protest
Featured

Iraqi Kurdistan Opposition Parties Resign from Government Cabinet

by Joanne Stocker
December 20, 2017
Next Post
Afghanistan, additional troops, Trump, strategy, insurgency, Afghan civilians

US Intensifying Afghanistan Air Campaign Certain to Boost Insurgency

Russia, Russian jet, MiG, MiG-29, Zapad, war games, Zapad exercises

Russia and Belarus Begin Massive Zapad War Games

Recommended

What President Biden Should Do About the Uyghur Genocide

What President Biden Should Do About the Uyghur Genocide

February 26, 2021
Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (L) meets with Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok in Khartoum, last August

Sudan’s Normalization With Israel Is a Win for Everyone

February 26, 2021
Ethiopian refugees who fled the conflict in Tigray gather to receive aid at the Tenedba camp.

Eritrean Troops Killed ‘Hundreds’ in Ethiopia Massacre: Amnesty

February 26, 2021
COVID-19 vaccine

Syria Health Workers to Receive Covid Vaccine From Next Week

February 25, 2021
Moria migrant camp which was destroyed in a fire in 2020 on the Greek Aegean island of Lesbos.

Pregnant Migrant Sets Herself on Fire in Greek Camp

February 24, 2021
HRW released a statement on China's increasing prosecution of Muslim minorities in Xinjiang.

China Targets Uighurs With More Prosecutions, Longer Prison Terms: HRW

February 24, 2021

Opinion

What President Biden Should Do About the Uyghur Genocide

What President Biden Should Do About the Uyghur Genocide

February 26, 2021
Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (L) meets with Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok in Khartoum, last August

Sudan’s Normalization With Israel Is a Win for Everyone

February 26, 2021
Stolpersteine in Greifswald, Germany.

I Can’t Mark Where My Grandfather Is Buried, but I Want to Mark Where He Lived

February 26, 2021
Republican Senator from Missouri Josh Hawley

Trump’s Acquittal and Republican Senators: Not Setting the Bar Low Enough

February 22, 2021
Why Not Equality for America’s Puerto Rican Men and Women?

Why Not Equality for America’s Puerto Rican Men and Women?

February 19, 2021
Refugee child holding up a sign reading 'we are human like you'

US Asylum Laws Must Catch up With the Reality of Today’s Refugees

February 18, 2021
Facebook Twitter

Newsletter

Do you like our reporting?
SUBSCRIBE

About Us

The Globe Post

The Globe Post is part of Globe Post Media, a U.S. digital news organization that is publishing the world's best targeted news sites.

submit oped

© 2018 The Globe Post

No Result
View All Result
  • National
  • World
  • Business
  • Interviews
  • Lifestyle
  • Democracy at Risk
    • Media Freedom
  • Opinion
    • Editorials
    • Columns
    • Book Reviews
    • Stage
  • Submit Op-ed

© 2018 The Globe Post