Two weeks ago, I again visited Iraqi Kurdistan—often referred to as the Iraqi Kurdistan Government (KRG)—to deliver the keynote address on “Kurdish Identity” at an international conference held at Sulaymaniyah University in the PUK (The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan) area. Thus, I thought this would be a suitable time to reappraise recent Kurdish issues mainly in Iraq, but also in regards to Kurdish issue in Turkey, Syria, and Iran. I had occasion to discuss all of these subjects while there this time. Despite so many negative things I have heard about the current Iranian government, I found it particularly interesting to meet so many Iranian male and female Kurds at the conference and in the city.
The KRG currently has many of the trappings of an independent state: its own president, prime minister and parliament; its own flag and national anthem; its own army that has the right to prevent the federal Iraqi army from entering the Kurdish region; its own international airports and educational system in which Kurdish is the principal language of instruction; and even its own stamp entered into the passports of visitors. However, the KRG has failed to agree on a constitution. This tells one much about the debilitating divisions the KRG still suffers. Still, although many wondered what would happen to the KRG once the remaining US troops were mostly, but not completely withdrawn from Iraq at the end of 2011, the Kurds have managed to survive and to some extent even prosper without them.
Nevertheless, despite the relatively new sense of Kurdish nationalism or Kurdayeti, Kurdish divisions continue to inhibit their march to independence. These divisions not only exist among the Kurds living in the four states of Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria, but also within each one of these states. The continuing divisions between the KDP and PUK, of course, are very well known to all who follow Kurdish politics. They greatly inhibit the development of the KRG. Indeed, the author of this article cannot emphasize how frequently he hears important government officials and knowledgeable scholars say how the Kurdish population in northern Iraq must get their act together and overcome their debilitating divisions for them to achieve their just goals of economic development, peace, and even eventual independence. Only then can the United States and their other potential friends support them better instead of manipulating them through divide-and-rule tactics.
Despite this common objective of independence and statehood, the Kurds are notoriously divided geographically, politically, linguistically and tribally. In all the Kurdish revolts of the 20th century, for example, significant numbers of Kurds supported the national government of the country in which they found themselves, owing to tribal antipathies for those who were rebelling. In Iraq, pro-government Kurds have been derisively referred to as josh (little donkeys), while Turkey has encouraged the creation of a pro-government militia of Kurds—the so-called village guards. Recently, however, a greater sense of pan-Kurdish identity has arisen for a number of reasons, including the collapse of the authoritarian regime of Saddam Hussain in Iraq in 2003, increasing Kurdish rights in Turkey, and the long-running civil war in Syria since 2011. Although Iran too has seen significant Kurdish unrest, it has been on a lesser scale. Thus, Kurdish divisions long played a significant role in defining Kurdish identity and still do. Kurdish nationalism came late and mainly as a reaction to Arab, Turkish, and Iranian nationalism after World War I. However, divided by philosophy, geography, dialect, and ambition, the Barzani’s KDP and Talabani’s PUK have alternated between cooperation and conflict ever since. They both have also suffered from repression, such as the genocidal Anfal campaign of 1986–89 led by the regime of Saddam Hussein, including the chemical attack on the city of Halabja in March 1988.
Despite the fact that the KRG began to emerge in northern Iraq following Saddam Hussein’s defeat in the 1990–91 Gulf War, the KDP and PUK proceeded to fight a civil war against each other during 1994–98. On my visit last month, I met several Kurds who had lost family members in that internecine struggle. As a result of this internal Kurdish fighting, there were two separate rump governments in Iraqi Kurdistan from 1994–2006: the KDP-led administration in Erbil and the PUK’s in Sulaymaniya. The USA finally brokered a ceasefire after negotiations to which both Masoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani were invited to Washington, DC, in September 1998.
Despite being economically underdeveloped historically, for some time the KRG region has witnessed a significant amount of economic, political and social modernization. Indeed, the economy of the KRG prospered, relative to the rest of Iraq, in the late 1990s due to the oil-for-food program funds it received from the sale of Iraqi oil through the United Nations (UN). Furthermore, given the security problems to the south, many foreign investors were attracted to the much safer KRG region after 2003. Currently, the KRG supposedly receives 17 percent of the Iraqi federal budget, but in practice often goes for long periods of time without anything due to disagreements between the two over oil exports.
Since the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime in 2003, many foreign investors—particularly Turkish—have been attracted to the region and construction has been booming. Modern stores, homes and automobiles have proliferated. Two international airports have been constructed and are handling more than 100 flights a week in Irbil and Sulaymaniya, while a third airport operates in contested Kirkuk. As many as 31 universities or other schools of higher education were also operating, although some were of marginal quality. However, huge discrepancies in wealth also have developed, as well as corruption and nepotism. Problems between the KRG and the federal Government in Baghdad continue, regarding access to the vast Iraqi oil reserves, the internal border between the KRG and the rest of Iraq, and the future of the province and the city of Kirkuk.
The Iraqi Constitution, approved by referendum in October 2005, established a federal structure for Iraq that granted significant powers to the regions. Indeed, for the first time most Kurds now thought of their government in Erbil, not the one in Baghdad, when the concept of government was raised. However, as already noted, the actual division of power between the Iraqi federal government and the KRG remains in dispute. As noted above, the contested matters included the ownership of the vast oil reserves and the control of the revenues flowing from them, the role of the KRG army or peshmerga (militia), and the final status of Kirkuk and its surrounding territory, among others. As of today, the KRG and the Iraqi federal government often remain locked in a protracted disagreement over their differences.
Thinking about these problems, I also know how much economic, social, and political progress has occurred since my first visit in July 1993 to attend a KDP congress in Erbil. On my visit last month, I found first-class shopping centers and restaurants that compare well with the best in the West. Two major universities grace Sulaymaniyah, the newer American University in Sulaymaniyah (AUIS) with some 1700 students and the older Sulaymaniyah University with about 24,000 students. Each has a large, modern campus and is situated next to the other. Many faculty and students speak English, some very well. I visited the peshmerga museum covered with photos on the walls of by-gone days. I also walked through a large, interesting bazaar and came across the former home of Ibrahim Ahmad, a Kurdish intellectual and politician who was the father-in-law of Jalal Talabani. I once met Ibrahim Ahmad in London in the late 1990s and spend a long afternoon talking to him. I remember well his disdain for Mulla Mustafa Barzani, whose family expressed reciprocal dislike for him. Not a good barometer for future cooperation. The roads of Sulaymaniyah are filled with modern cars. However, the relatively new (by Kurdish standards having been founded in 1785)) city is situated in a hollow surrounded by mountains so suffers from an air pollution problem caused by fuel exhaust and sand storms from the south. On some days the near-by mountains are not even visible.
Remembering my first visit to Kurdistan in 1993, I still remember how Masoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani were sitting next to each other smiling and talking so amicably. Yet just a few months later they fell into a bitter civil war that killed hundreds. The divisions still remain. For example, while I was speaking at the PUK conference at Sulaymaniyah University two weeks ago, a KDP conference on the same subject of Kurdish identity was taking place at Hewler University in Erbil. The two sides could not even get together for an academic conference.
Still, less than two years ago in September 2023, I had been invited to present a keynote speech to the KDP side at Soran University. That in itself was an achievement because in May 2017, while presenting the keynote speech at Hewler University in the KDP area, I had created somewhat of a national controversy by briefly mentioning nepotism and corruption as problems to be solved by the KRG government. I was almost pulled off the state in front of maybe a thousand attendees, but was saved by then and still KRG President Nechirvan Barzani who was sitting in front of the entire audience. To his credit, he gestured to the enforcers to let me continue speaking. If he had not done so, I would have been stopped in my tracks. As it was, I was still told I never would be invited back. Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman, an old friend and the then KRG representative in the United States, whispered to me after my talk that I was the devil for what I had said. Other Western scholars have suffered the same fate for things they said that did not meet official approval. Fortunately, in my case, the Kurdish power structures had a short memory, and I have returned several times.
What did I find this time? Maybe the most interesting conversation I enjoyed was with Barham Salih, a former KRG prime minister from 2009-2012 and more famously, president of Iraq from 2018-2022. Barham Salih is a highly educated leader with a PhD in Statistics and Computer Applications in Engineering from the University of Liverpool in 1987. He also established the AUIS in 2007. When I met Jalal Talabani on my first trip to Kurdistan in the summer of 1993, Mam Jalal as he is still often referred to, told me that Barham Salih had a very bright future in the PUK. Others have told me that Talabani even wanted Barham to be his ultimate successor because he was so capable. However, Barham was not a member of the Talabani (or for that matter the Barzani family), so was never eligible for the highest position. The result is that Iraqi Kurdistan’s most able diplomat and politician is currently out of office and has little prospect of returning.
When in office, Barham Salih usually made a positive impression on foreign leaders because of his competency, honesty, and command of the English language. I have known Barham Salih since 1993 when he was the PUK representative in Washington, DC. The Kurds were so unimportant then, that every time I journeyed to Washington, he had time to meet with me for several hours. Thus, I learned many things that have served me well over the years. However, when Jalal Talabani called Barham back to Kurdistan around 2000, I no longer saw him save briefly at an occasional conference in Kurdistan.
This time, Barham invited me to his mountain top mansion, a 20-minute drive from Sulaymaniyah. He remembered our earlier interactions, and quickly began telling me about his experiences as Iraqi president a few years ago. For example, he had played a significant role in bringing Pope Francis to Kurdistan a few years earlier. (Ironically Francis died later that very day Barham was remembering him.) Barham also told me he found the late British Queen Elizabeth very interesting to meet. Among other endeavors, Barham currently was a Senior Fellow at the Middle East Initiative Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School.
However, most importantly, he told me that family rule by the Barzanis and Talabanis prevented greater economic and political progress in Kurdistan. Nepotism and corruption remained serious problems and had no ready solution. He agreed that visiting the Sulaymaniyah PUK region was almost like another country compared to visiting Erbil in the KDP region. In Sulaymaniyah, there were pictures of the late Jalal Talabani and other PUK luminaries everywhere. Only in the peshmerga museum did I espy a few barely visible photos of some Barzanis mixed in with thousands of other photos pinned to the walls of the museum. In ancient Erbil (Alexander the Great fought one of his greatest battles near here), the capital of the KRG and center of KDP rule, the situation is exactly the opposite. Erbil is KDP country. Barzani photos are everywhere. One would hardly know that the Talabanis even existed.
What does the mean? Everyone knows in their hearts, that the Kurds ultimately want independence. However, what does this indicate exactly?[1] One pan-Kurdish state? Doubtful! KRG independence, while in Turkey, Iran, and even Syria, not even autonomy, but merely constitutionally guaranteed rights? Why not several different Kurdish states, at least the KRG and maybe the AANES (Rojava) in Syria? After all, there are some 22 Arab states and 6 Turkic states. So, if Kurdish unity is so difficult to achieve, why not at least 2 different Kurdish states, the KRG and Rojava? More precisely, given what I found just two weeks ago on my trip to Sulaymaniyah, why not two separate Kurdish states in northern Iraq or at least for the time being, a loose confederation between them? In the 1990s, Yugoslavia eventually divided into 7 separate, smaller states. Sometimes division is the best solution when the parties cannot get along.
Because the Iraqi Kurds supported the United States in its two wars against Saddam Hussein, the U.S. helped them birth the semi-autonomous, federal KRG. However, even the United States strongly opposed its advisory referendum on independence held on September 25, 2017. Indeed, in the name of stability, almost everyone in the world opposed even considering KRG independence except Israel and Iceland.
Seventy Two percent of the eligible voters in the KRG region cast ballots and 93% of them favored independence. But in the PUK stronghold Sulaymaniyah (Slemani), voter turnout was only 50% of the eligible voters and only 80% voted for independence. So, this means that in Sulaymaniyah, less than half the eligible voters favored independence. Instead, they saw the independence referendum as a premature, unilateral KDP initiative and so, in effect, voted, “no.” The Iraqi Kurdish identity remained challenged by continuing disunity.
However, the Iraqi Kurds should not be discouraged at the lack of U.S. support. After all, look at Europe. Under Trump, the United States almost seems hesitant even to guarantee Europe’s independence from Putin’s Russia. So, if this is true for America’s long time NATO ally, Europe, the KRG might consider itself fortunate to have whatever support it can get from Trump’s America. This means if the KRG still seeks eventual independence, it must be patient and play the waiting game.
In the meanwhile, the KRG, being a federal part of Iraq, satisfies its powerful regional neighbors: Turkey, Iran, and Baghdad, plus the United States. And also, just as important, being a federal part of Iraq, gives the KRG protection as part of Iraq, which seems possibly more today than what Europe has. On the other hand, if the KRG had independence, it might not have any protection at all. So, for the time being, the KRG remaining a federal part of Iraq gives it more protection all around, than dangerous independence would! Independence will only come if Iraq breaks up. This remains possible given how weak and divided Iraq is. However, again, unless and until Iraq collapses, being an autonomous, federal part of Iraq offers a better position for the Kurds than premature independence. The future fate of the KRG in particular, remains inextricably linked to and dependent on the future of Iraq and the wider geopolitical restructuring of the Middle East as well as the Kurdish ability to achieve their own unity. All of these requirements for KRG independence will be difficult, but not impossible to achieve in time.
The most recent KRG elections were held in October 2024 with the KDP winning 39 seats, the PUK 23, the New Generation Movement (focusing on anti-corruption, economic liberalization, and social tolerance) 15, and the Kurdistan Islamic Union 7. Smaller groups won the remaining 17 seats. The once powerful Gorran party virtually ceased to exist, its reformist founder and leader, Nawshirwan Mustafa, having died in 2017. A half year later, no new government has been formed. What does this say about Iraqi Kurdish unity and political development? The glass is either half empty, but maybe more importantly remains half full. Iraqi national elections, in which of course the Kurds will participate, are scheduled for November 11, 2025 and may or may not significantly affect the situation.
Finally, one of the most frequently asked questions I met on my visit was what I thought the current so-called peace process between Turkey and the PKK portended. I quickly replied that is seemed unlikely to be successful because it appears more like a PKK surrender than a guarantee of Kurdish constitutional rights in return for disarming and disbanding the PKK. The two sides remain in different universes. The Turkish government sees the issue simply as one of terrorism. But the PKK views it as a much broader one of Kurdish constitutional rights for Turkey’s Kurds as Kurds. Thus, unless there will be some positive concessions for the Kurds—and this does not seem to be happening—the so-called peace process seems dead on arrival!
The PKK is not just going to go away after more than 40 years of struggle. What could Ocalan possibly be thinking? Historically, Turkish promises to the Kurds are worth little, but in this case, there are not even any tantalizing promises, only a demand for surrender. After more than a quarter of a century of incarceration, often under conditions of long periods of total isolation, the 75-years old Reber (Leader) may have lost touch with reality or at least fallen under the influence of the Stockholm syndrome on the one hand, and the almost obsequious adoration of a cult of personality from his followers that leads him to think he can do no wrong. Or maybe, Ocalan is simply trying to put the onus of failure on Turkey for not accepting his proposals.
Although Ocalan remains the titular leader of the PKK, I doubt that the current collective PKK leadership for more than a quarter of a century is going to accept readily his return to actual command if the Turkish government releases him as many Kurds hope under this new, so-called peace process. For that matter, if the PKK actually disbands, what would there be for Ocalan to command? Maybe what the Turkish government really wants to do is to release Ocalan and thus cause a rift in the PKK between Ocalan freed and the collective leadership that has been running daily affairs since Ocalan’s capture more than a quarter of a century ago.
That my initial scepticism was correct appears to be accurate. Murat Karayilan, one of the most senior PKK leaders, told the 12th Congress of the PKK held May 5-7, 2025 in the Medya Defense Areas in northern Iraq supposedly to disband the PKK that the Turkish state must urgently pass new laws to move the process further. Otherwise, there would be no peace. All of this reminded one of similar earlier PKK initiatives that had failed. For example, in 2002, the PKK even had abolished the name PKK for the new one of Kurdistan Freedom and Democracy Congress (KADEK). The name change supposedly represented the PKK’s declared intention to become a legal Kurdish party in Turkey seeking to promote democracy and cultural rights for Kurds in Turkey and headed by Ocalan. When all this failed, the new name KADEK was abandoned and that of the PKK reinstated. A decade later the Kurdish Opening and its similar promises of Kurdish constitutional rights also failed. What is different this time?
In his extended remarks to the recent extraordinary PKK Congress supposedly disarming and dissolving itself, Murat Karayilan made the following most important provisos that clearly indicate that the PKK has no intention of disarming and dissolving itself unless Turkey makes significant, but highly unlikely, concessions that constitutionally guarantee Kurdish rights.
“This is how we must understand the dissolution of the PKK. . . . For the decision to end the armed struggle to be implemented, legal reforms are required. . . . The existence of legal and democratic political rights is essential. The movement [PKK] has defended itself for years through armed struggle, but it must also come to believe in laws, rights, and the constitution. Therefore, concrete legal steps must be taken, reforms must be enacted. . . . There must be a shift in the state’s policy of denial and annihilation. Without a change in this mindset, on what basis will internal peace be established? Those who claim they seek peace must first abandon the mentality of denial and annihilation. There must be a genuine peace. The existing laws are hostile laws; they reject the Kurdish people and Kurdish society. Therefore, only through legal and constitutional reform by the state can this movement implement disarmament. Otherwise, it will be extremely difficult. . . . For us to genuinely lay down our arms, we must also be able to trust the state. At present, the approach of the Turkish state does not inspire much trust. . . . The mindset that says, “We can eliminate them by force, we’ve already weakened them we’ll win through operations and attacks,” is not a mindset of resolution. It is not a sound approach. The guerrilla can continue the struggle in line with the methods and demands of this era and can once again demonstrate its invincibility. . . . We believe that the strategy of armed warfare must come to an end. However, if the state refuses to accept this and does not implement the necessary legal changes, it will not be possible to realize this in practice. . . . We must approach it with this understanding.”2
In conclusion, the Kurds, especially in Iraq, have made enormous progress in recent years towards constitutional guaranteed economic, social, and even political rights as Kurds. However, much remains to be accomplished, elusive Kurdish coordination and unity being of utmost importance. In addition, the current so-called Turkish-PKK peace process is highly unlikely to succeed.
Endnotes
[1] On the prospects of future Kurdish independence, see the thoughtful study by Michael Rubin, Kurdistan Rising? Considerations for Kurds, Their Neighbors, and the Region (Washington: American Enterprise Institute, 2016).
[2] Cited in “Karayilan: The Turkish State Must Urgently Pass Laws to Move the Process Further,” ANF News, May 14, 2025, https://anfenglishmobile.com/features/karayilan-turkish-state-must-urgently-pass-laws-to-enable-ceasefire-79340, accessed May 16, 2025.
