Kurdistan Regional Government Could Support Autonomy for Iraq's Yazidis
22:56 23.02.2017
The Kurdistan Regional Government Representative to the United States Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman said that KRG was not opposed to autonomous areas for Iraq's Yazidi and Christian minorities.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) – The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) is not opposed to autonomous areas for Iraq's Yazidi and Christian minorities, KRG Representative to the United States Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman said on Thursday.
"We have no issue with autonomy for them," Abdul Rahman said during a talk at the Hudson Institute. "We should listen to them and we should give them what is necessary."
Abdul Rahman said Yazidis and Christians could inhabit one autonomous zone or both minorities could control their own separate areas.
KRG President Masoud Barzani has previously stressed that Sinjar, the northern Iraqi town mainly inhabited by Yazidis, is part of Kurdistan.
But Yazidi rights groups have alleged Erbil misled them about the threat Daesh posed in Sinjar and for delaying aid to Yazidi women who escaped the terror group.
Separately, Abdul Rahman noted the KRG was grateful for the Kurdistan Workers' Party's (PKK) liberating the Yazdis after the Islamic State overran Sinjar, but said the terror group's presence there had since become problematic.
Iraq's Yazidis and Christians could gain autonomy through a referendum similar to the one Barzani has proposed for Kurdistan.
© Sputnik
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