Iraqi Kurds Reject ‘Canceling’ Independence Vote: ‘the People Determined Their Future’

Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has rejected calls from Baghdad to “cancel” the results of the September referendum on independence, asserting that the government cannot annul the will of its people.

On September 26, an overwhelming majority of people living in KRG-controlled areas voted to establish a sovereign state and secede from Iraq. While the KRG has adamantly repeated that the vote was non-binding and they would seek dialogue before establishing a state, the Iraqi government has responded to the vote by shutting down international flights into and out of KRG territory and acting to strip Kurdish lawmakers of the parliamentary positions.

“Annulling its result is not as easy as the officials in Baghdad think,” KRG spokesperson Safeen Dizayee asserted in a written statement in response to that demand, according to the Kurdish outlet Rudaw. “It was the people who determined their future in the referendum,” he continued. On Twitter, he asserted that fully disregarding the results of the referendum was disrespectful to all those voting in it:

Rudaw reports that the final tally saw 92.7 percent of those participating voting “yes” to independence from Iraq. It notes that Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has nonetheless demanded the KRG disregard those results and annul the entire procedure, stating that holding such a vote, even if non-binding, is “unconstitutional.”

“The Kurdistan Region has to cancel the result of the unconstitutional referendum and then engage in serious dialogue with Baghdad to strengthening the integrity of Iraq,” Abadi’s press office said in a statement Monday following Baghdad taking a number of measures against Erbil, including attempting to shut down its land borders and expel Kurdish representatives from Parliament.

Baghdad is also demanding the return of Kirkuk to Iraqi authorities. While the city of Kirkuk is not traditionally part of Kurdistan and boasts significant Arab and Turkmen populations, the Kurdistan Regional Government has controlled it since it defeated the Islamic State there in 2014. While the Iraqi army fled during the first round of ISIS attacks, the Kurdish Peshmerga persisted and kept the Islamic State from taking over the oil-rich city. Residents of Kirkuk voted in the KRG’s independence referendum.

Last week, with its Kurdish members boycotting, the Iraqi Parliament voted to encourage Abadi to send troops into Kirkuk to fight the Peshmerga. The deployment has not yet occurred and, given the history of the Iraqi army, many suspect the Peshmerga would come out of such a battle as winners. Iraqi has also begun military exercises with Iraq on the KRG border, which some see as an intimidation measure and reminder to the KRG that its neighbors, with the exception of Israel, all oppose its independence.

In his statement, Dizayee did not address any potential military clashes, instead asserting that the Peshmerga “are not a foreign force that have come from outside Iraq and invaded these areas [the Kirkuk region]. Rather, as it is mentioned in the Iraqi constitution, the Peshmerga forces are a part of the federal Iraq’s defense system.” He noted that the Peshmerga have kept ISIS out of that territory “without any national and religious discrimination.”

Some Iraqi minorities living in KRG regions have alleged that they were coerced into voting “yes” during the referendum, but those claims have not been substantiated by any international observers, who unanimously concluded that the vote was free and fair.

In Baghdad, Kurdish representatives are fighting to remain in parliament. The Shiite majority there is using the fact that they boycotted the vote to condemn the referendum to argue that they should be stripped of their legislative immunity and their seats in the parliament. “The Kurdish MPs were told that they had lost their legitimacy following the Sep. 25 referendum,” according to a report in the outlet Kurdistan24. The parliament has reportedly offered Kurdish representatives a chance to “renounce their vote and express regret for taking part in the referendum” if they wish to return to their seats.