ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani said on Sunday that the Region’s two biggest parties have yet to reach an agreement on a joint candidate for Iraq’s presidency. The federal parliament has indefinitely postponed a scheduled session to elect a new president for the country.
The parliamentary session scheduled for Sunday to elect a new president was postponed, state media reported. No new date has been specified for the meeting.
Prime Minister Barzani, who is also a deputy leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), said talks with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) were ongoing. “No agreement has been made yet.”
On Friday, 52 lawmakers submitted a formal request to parliament’s presidency, urging the KDP and PUK to resolve their differences and agree on a single candidate ahead of the session.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein said last week that the KDP was prepared to hand over its federal posts to the PUK in exchange for the presidency, should the two sides agree on a candidate.
A total of 19 candidates, Kurdish and Arab, are competing for the position, though the eventual winner is widely expected to come from the KDP, the PUK, or be a consensus nominee backed by both parties.