A victory for Kurdistan’s minorities

Rachel Avraham

Nechirvan Barzani was recently sworn in as Kurdistan’s new president, and already he is a beacon of light, spreading peace, toleration and harmony throughout the region.

After being sworn in, he visited Baghdad and met the Iraqi prime minister. Afterward, he was invited to Turkey and France, where he was welcomed by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and President Emmanuel Macron as Kurdistan’s leader.

One of his main objectives as president is to promote inter-faith dialogue, positive relations with his neighbors and minority rights within his own borders. For this reason, the minorities of Kurdistan are greatly pleased that he was recently sworn in, believing that his presidency increases the likelihood that they will continue to be treated fairly in Kurdistan and that he can serve as a positive example for other nations in the Middle East.

Muna Qahwachi, Kurdistan’s parliamentary president and a member of the Turkman community, proclaimed in an exclusive interview that “when Article 5 was passed in the Kurdistan Parliament in 2015, all of the wishes and desires of the minorities were addressed in this article. For this reason, we voted for President Nechirvan Barzani to emphasize to the people of Kurdistan that we trust President Barzani. We believe that his platform for the presidency over the next four years includes minority rights for Turkmen, Chaldeans, Assyrians, Yazidis and all other groups. As a Turkman, woman and the president of the Kurdistan Parliament, we as Turkmen and other minorities got many positions in the new KRG cabinet and this can serve as a model regarding the treatment of minorities in other parts of Iraq. Barzani is famous for peaceful coexistence.”

When Mr. Barzani was prime minister, he established a special office to rescue Yazidis. According to official figures from the Kurdistan Regional government, since 2014, more than 3,340 Yazidis have been liberated from ISIS captivity since he opened the office to rescue Yazidis. While it is true that ISIS kidnapped 6,417 Yazidis and 2,992 of them remain missing, Yazidis can rest assured that Kurdistan’s new president will not rest until all of the Yazidis are rescued from ISIS captivity.

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