ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – The ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) has dropped conditions it had put on reactivating the parliament ten weeks before the Region is to hold a referendum on independence and that direct calls have been made to the Change Movement (Gorran) for face-to-face talks.
“The KDP now has no conditions for the reactivation of the parliament, and won’t accept conditions from anyone,” KDP’s Hemin Hawrami said in an interview with Rudaw on Monday night. Hawrami is senior assistant to President Masoud Barzani.
Hawrami said that for the KDP the referendum and its chosen date “is far more important that anything else” and therefore his party is open to direct and face-to-face talks with the Change Movement (Gorran).
He revealed that President Barzani has instructed the KDP to make direct calls to Gorran and that the contact had been made on Sunday.
“Gorran’s response was positive,” Hawrami said, without providing further details.
Gorran has avoided all meetings on the planned September referendum, arguing that such a project must be endorsed by the parliament which has been suspended since October 2015.
Hawrami told Rudaw that the KDP sees the parliament and the future of the people of Kurdistan “above all else” and that Gorran was welcome to direct negotiations on reopening the legislature.
The KDP move is a major step towards ending a political deadlock that has gripped the Kurdistan Region for more than a year and a half.
Hawrami said that the KDP and all other parties that have signed up to the referendum are determined to go ahead with the project on its chosen date and that from technical and financial point of view all preparations have been made.
He said that Gorran or the Islamic League (Komal) must only have political reasons for opposing the referendum and that “they must explain to people clearly what their reasons are,”
