Nichirvan Barzani will once again soon become the prime minister of the KRG. Mr. Barzani assumes this high office at a particularly dangerous time because the final U.S. troop withdrawal last month has helped create a new budding crisis along the sectarian and ethnic dividing lines in Iraq. The less U.S. presence, the more turmoil many would argue. Once again pundits are talking about the unmentionable, the breakup of Iraq. If this should occur, the KRG will be able to move towards its long-cherished goal, namely independence. However, is this a wise thing to do for a landlocked entity surrounded by potential enemies and now without any significant armed support with the departure of the Americans? The current federal solution to the Kurdish problem offered the Kurds practically everything they wanted in the way of running their own affairs without the problems of independence.

Furthermore, the continuing problems of Turkish and Iranian ambitions in northern Iraq continue to play out and expand. The presence of the PKK and PJAK in the Kandil Mountains serves as a wedge for both these regional superpowers to intervene in the KRG any time they want to. More immediately, the current crisis over Iran’s possibly going nuclear and the United States responding with a preemptive attack against Iran could pull the KRG into an unwanted crisis and is enough to challenge the wisest of Kurdish leaders. Also problematic is the continuing Kurdish unrest in Turkey that could easily spill over the border into the region of the KRG and thus sabotage all that the KRG has built up economically and even politically with Turkey.

Finally Mr. Barzani will have to deal with the continuing demands of what might be called the Kurdish Spring. Nichirvan Barzani’s return to the prime ministership once again calls attention to the continuing accusations of nepotism, corruption, and cronyism. Clearly, the new KRG prime minister will have a difficult road to travel.

Professor Michael M. Gunter
Tennessee Technological University
USA