ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Two infantry divisions of Kurdish Peshmerga forces reunified in a step to unify the Peshmerga forces. The two units separated after the events in Kirkuk. Infantry Brigades 1 and 2 of the Peshmerga Ministry reunified after a 100-day separation following the events of October 16 albeit with tweaks to high ranking positions. The process will be completed by next week. “Peshmerga forces have always been ready [for unity] and the two Peshmerga units have never had issues with each other”, Col. Hemin Hassan, told Rudaw, who was previously deputy commander of the 1st Brigade will now lead the 2nd Brigade of Peshmerga forces. He added that the day of the separation was a day of crying for Peshmerga, akin to a child crying for his mother and a brother crying for his brother. Kurdish leaders finger-pointed and made claims of treason after Iraqi forces supported by Iran-backed Hashd al-Shaabi controlled Kirkuk in 2017. The unification is “a feast” for us, exclaimed the colonel. All Peshmerga forces are officially under the command of Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani since the resignation President Masoud Barzani in November. As the Office of the Presidency has not been dissolved, the Kurdistan Region parliament passed the powers of the commander-in-chief of all armed forces to the prime ministry. The 1 and 2 Brigades directly were paid salaries, armed, and trained by the United States, which leads the international anti-ISIS coalition, in early-2016 prior to the operation to oust ISIS from Iraq’s second-largest city of Mosul. The Ministry of Peshmerga has a number of other brigades and special units. Some like the 80 Force units and the 70 Force which are aligned with the PUK and KDP, respectively. The Kurdistan Region’s parliament in 2014 stipulated for the KRG to unite all Peshmerga as a national army within six months, especially the political units, but remains fully unimplemented. “It is planned by the next week that the Chief of General Staff of Peshmerga [Jamal Iminiki] will meet with a committee to initiate the unification of the Peshmerga forces,” Sarbast Lazgin, Peshmerga deputy minister told Rudaw. Plans also will be formulated to unify the rest of the Peshmerga. “We have discussed this matter with Sheikh Jaafar as well, and we realize that changes need to be made,” Lazgin added. Sheikh Jaafar Sheikh Mustafa commands the 70 Force. Najat Ali Saleh commands the 80 Force. The Peshmerga ministry and 70th units will prepare projects on the unification process that will later on be submitted to PM Barzani. A committee will be formed to address the shortcomings and ease the process of the unification. There were 14 unified Peshmerga brigades prior to the events of October 16, but just six unified brigades currently. The unification is set to rectify that and add more unified divisions. Opposition parties, especially the Change Movement (Gorran) have called on the government to nationalize the Peshmerga forces and eliminate party influence over them, citing events of Kirkuk as why such control is bad. Barham Salih, the head of the newly-formed Coalition for Justice and Democracy, met with Brett McGurk, the US Special Presidential Envoy to the Coalition, on January 18 in Sulaimani. Salih said discussed “nationalizing the Peshmerga forces.” McGurk then met with KRG leaders PM Barzani and Deputy PM Qubad Talabani in Erbil. “Constructive meetings with KRG PM Barzani and DPM Talabani on post-ISIS stabilization, support to Peshmerga, and the vital importance of a strong and unified KRG within the constitutional framework of Iraq,” wrote McGurk in a subsequent tweet. The United States has approved a funding of $365 million for Peshmerga in 2018, a move welcome by the Peshmerga ministry.
