ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) are scheduled to meet next week to resume much-delayed talks on forming the tenth cabinet of the Kurdistan Region, a senior PUK official said on Tuesday.
"Next week, the KDP and PUK will meet. The meeting was originally scheduled for today but was postponed," Qubad Talabani, PUK politburo member and deputy prime minister of the Kurdistan Region, told reporters without providing a reason for the postponement.
The KDP has not commented on the scheduled meeting.
The discussions are expected to focus on forming the next Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) cabinet and distributing ministerial portfolios, sources from both parties previously told Rudaw.
The Kurdistan Region held long-delayed parliamentary elections in October 2024, with the KDP winning 39 of the 100 seats and the PUK securing 23. With no party holding a majority, government-formation talks had been ongoing for months but recently stalled due to disagreements over governance mechanisms and key positions.
The key wrangling is said to be on the post of the interior minister - the position which the KDP has traditionally held and insisted on maintaining it.
Baghdad visit
Talabani recently led a high-level PUK delegation to Baghdad, meeting with leaders across Iraq’s political spectrum to discuss federal government formation, nearly a month after the country’s legislative elections.
"Talks to form the cabinet have progressed well, and our visit to Baghdad was a good opportunity to understand the vision of the Iraqi parties," Talabani said.
"We met the majority of the parties. We feel there is an organized and stable process, and we hope it will result in the formation of the federal government,” he added.
In the November 11 elections, the PUK won 18 seats nationwide, emerging as Iraq’s eighth-largest party and the second-largest in the Kurdistan Region.
Talabani said the visit also aimed to present the PUK’s vision and position to Baghdad. "We are an Iraqi party and believe in a strong Iraq,” he said, adding that a stronger Iraq means a stronger Kurdistan.
Traditionally, the Iraqi presidency has been held by a PUK member since 2005, two years after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime.
"We do not have a candidate yet, but we will," Talabani said. "We do not know who he is at this stage."
The incumbent Iraqi President Abdul Latif Rashid is a senior member of the PUK.
During his two-day Baghdad visit, Talabani met with Nouri al-Maliki, head of the State of Law coalition and Iraq’s former prime minister. In a statement, the powerful Iraqi politician’s office said the two discussed in detail the post of the Iraqi president with Talabani - something missing in Talabani’s statement on the meeting.
The PUK and KDP are at odds over the presidential post, and may enter the race with separate candidates if no agreement is reached. They raced for the position last time and the PUK’s Rashid secured it.
Fuad Hussein, Iraq’s foreign minister and a senior KDP member, said his party intends to contest the presidency.
"The KDP and PUK are likely to enter parliament with two candidates of their own," he told Rudaw on Sunday. "The KDP is adamant about securing the post of president of Iraq."
Hussein, who was KDP’s candidate for the mostly ceremonial federal position against Rashid, added that it would be better for the two parties to reach an agreement, warning that otherwise, the competition could be fierce.