PUK Ends Boycott, Rejoins KRG Meetings After Seven-Month Hiatus

Shafaq News/ The ministers affiliated with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) will rejoin the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) meetings, a spokesperson for Deputy Prime Minister Qubad Talabani announced on Saturday, marking the conclusion of a seven-month boycott.

In a post on social media, Samir Hawrami said that the PUK team, under Talabani's leadership, will attend the KRG meeting scheduled for Sunday.

Last week, the two ruling parties in the Iraqi Kurdistan region took initial steps to defuse tensions and pave the way for general elections by October.

The KDP, led by the Barzani family, controls Erbil and Duhok, while the PUK, led by the Talabani family, rules Sulaimaniyah and Halabja provinces.

Both parties are at odds over how the region's oil revenues are distributed, as well as over electoral constituency boundaries in amending the region's election law.

Masrour Barzani and his deputy Qubad Talabani met early last week amid an ongoing boycott by Talabani to attend the meetings of the KRG Council of Ministers.

Qubad Talabani, the KRG deputy prime minister and four other ministers from the party have boycotted the cabinet's regular meetings in Erbil since October 2022. The boycott, which nearly crippled the KRG and the Kurdistan parliament, was in protest of the KDP accusing PUK of being behind the killing of a senior counter-terrorism officer in Erbil on 7 October 2022.

The tensions between the two parties have also jeopardized delaying the region's parliamentary elections scheduled for November 18.

Tensions between the two rival parties were exacerbated early last month when Mazloum Abdi, a Kurdish commander of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), survived a Turkish drone attack in the vicinity of Sulaymaniyah International Airport. Both parties accused each other of providing information to Turkey to target Abdi.

Media reports said that Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani also delivered messages from the Iran-backed Coordination Framework to Prime Minister Barzani that he should settle differences within his cabinet if he wants the Iraqi parliament to pass the Kurdish share for this year's federal budget, estimated to be more than 12 percent.

The message from the Coordination Framework (CF)came after the PUK threatened to withdraw from the Running the State Coalition - which backed Sudani for the premiership and includes the CF, the Sunnis, and the two ruling Kurdish parties.

Kurdish sources said that both parties have agreed to activate the parliament and amend the region's election law, however, the quota seats of the minorities are yet to be settled.