Two Kurdish security officers injured in Turkish airstrike

Two members of Iraqi Kurdistan’s secret police, the Asayesh a organizations tasked with national security, were wounded by a Turkish airstrike in Semalka. Semalka is a Syria/Kurdistan border crossing outside of Duhok that has now been closed in the aftermath of the strike. Heavy bombardments from artillery and Turkish war planes have been experienced with […]

PKK leave Sinjar under threat of Turkish invasion

With the threat of Turkish military aggression and airstrikes looming over northern Kurdistan, the PKK based out of Sinjar have made the decision to withdraw from the region at the demand of the Iraqi government in an effort to protect the Yezidi and Kurdish citizens there. According to Sinjar’s governor, Mehma Xelil, made it clear that […]

PM Barzani blames PKK for Turkish military aggression in Iraqi-Kurdistan

This week Nechirvan Barzani, who is Prime Minister of the Kurdish Regional Government and leader of the PDK, addressed the issue of the Turkish military conducting cross border operations into Kurdistan in an attempt to target PKK militants via airstrikes. He told reporters during a press conference that the PKK is at fault and that […]

KRG employees conduct protests and strikes amid salary cuts

Kurdistan’s Regional Government will convene this week to debate altering the current salary-saving system, a concept that has been the subject of controversy and negative feedback since its proposal. The Council of Ministers for the KRG holding a meeting is taking place in the wake of mass protests by government employees demanding an abolition of […]

Coalition forces support establishing a modern Peshmerga

Nechirvan Barzani, Kurdistan’s Prime Minister, held a meeting with a delegation of British civilian and military officials this week to discuss the modernization of Iraqi Kurdistan’s military forces, specifically the Peshmerga. The meeting was attended by several KRG officials to include deputy Prime Minister Qubad Talabani of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. A statement released […]

The private sector and the rebuilding of the Middle East after ISIS

The U.S. Department of State is advocating the use of the private sector in the rebuilding and reconstruction of Syrian and Iraqi infrastructure in the wake of the war with the Islamic State. Rather than nation building as a government, they believe that privatizing the reformation process will be a far more feasible solution to […]

Kirkuk citizens flee their homes in fear of continued ISIS presence

Residents of Kirkuk’s southern territories have been abandoning their homes for fear of Islamic State attacks and kidnappings. They say that Iraqi security forces only maintain a presence within the main city and larger villages; that Hashdt al-Shaabi is not an acceptable anti-terrorism element and has not performed as a security force well. A resident […]

Flights to Kurdistan’s international airports are officially available, but not actually

International flights to and from Kurdistan have supposedly resumed. The Iraqi central government has sent teams to both Kurdistan airports that will control flight schedules, according to a press release. KRG Minister of Interior Karim Sinjari, Iraqi Minister of Interior Qasim al-Araji, and Bestun Zangana who is the head of the Transportation Committee for Iraqi parliament, […]

Kurdish guard receives life sentence for shooting government official

Bashdar Omer Faqe, an Iraqi Presidential Guard and member of the Kurdish Peshmerga, has been sentenced to life in prison for shooting and killing Saeer Kazim Akral, the assistant manager of the municipality in Dora neighbourhood in Baghdad, when Akral failed to stop at a checkpoint being manned by the Bashdar. The Iraqi court sentenced the guard […]

Airports in Kurdistan are to be re-opened by the Iraqi government

Haider al-Abadi, the Prime Minister for Iraq, has ordered the Kurdish Regional Government to allow the central Iraqi government to take control of Kurdistan’s airports on a federal level. This will be the first step in re-opening Kurdistan’s airports since their closure during the Kurdish independence referendum. Abadi stated, “Based on constitutional jurisprudence, the reopening of […]