Our Statements

december 10, 2020

Mesrur Barzani legitimizes Turkish occupation

During yesterday`s press conference Mesrur Barzani, prime minister of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, distorted a variety of recent events. The KDP failed to protect the Ezidi population against the IS attacks in 2014 and left it to its plight. With the latest deal it signed with the Iraqi government on October 9, 2020, the KDP has re-exposed the Ezidi people to a new danger.
The PKK rushed to help the Ezidi people against the IS attacks and prevented a massacre. Since then, it has helped the Ezidis build their own self-defense and self-administration bodies. In August 2018, the PKK officially withdrew its forces from Sinjar. The whole world witnessed this withdrawal on the news. Still, the KDP and the Turkish state have continued to claim the opposite and spread false propaganda. Thus, they have continuously criminalized and attacked Sinjar`s self-administration and self-defense forces.
Self-administration and self-defense are the most basic of all rights of the Ezidi people that have suffered 74 massacres to date. The people of Sinjar are asking for a constitutional guarantee for their self-defense and self-administration rights. We have supported this legitimate and justified demand of Sinjar`s people and will continue to do so in the future. Sinjar`s population considers the Erbil-Baghdad deal signed on October 9, 2020 an attack against their demands. For two months, the people of Sinjar have been protesting and repeatedly asking for the deal to be revoked. But with yesterday`s statement Mesrur Barzani has once again shown Sinjar as a target to be attacked. The autonomy of Sinjar does not violate the laws of the Kurdistan Region and of Iraq. The very opposite is true: It strengthens them.
In yesterday`s press conference Mesrur Barzani distorted and besmirched PKK`s heroic resistance against the Turkish occupation. He completely failed to mention the Turkish state that has occupied large parts of South Kurdish land. This stance of prime minister Mesrur Barzani only legitimizes the Turkish occupation and supports its continuation. We would like to once again call on the KDP to take sides with us against the Turkish occupation and solve all existing problems through dialogue.
Additionally, in the past days several KDP-affiliated news outlets have tried to claim that our Freedom Movement is responsible for acts of violence that occurred in the course of the latest protests in South Kurdistan. Those who are very deliberately spreading this kind of propaganda seek to provoke people against each other and deepen the tensions. They are even deliberately laying the ground for the policy of the Turkish state that destabilizes South Kurdistan and provokes in-fighting. The Turkish MIT has been undertaking such activities very actively anyway. As a movement, we have always – just like all other circles – demanded for the legitimate demands of the population to be answered and all problems to be solved through democratic methods. This is also our position regarding the latest protests. The burning of party buildings and official institutions and the use of violence is unacceptable and will only serve the enemies of the Kurdish people. At the same time, we condemn the use of violence and live ammunition against the protesters. The demands of the people are legitimate. They need to be immediately addressed with democratic means. Therefore, we would like to stress, once more, that the people should not fall for provocations while using their right to protest and that it is necessary for them to voice their demands using peaceful and democratic means.

KCK Foreign Relations Committee