“The agreement between the PUK and the Change movement could have a very positive impact on Iraqi Kurdistan and it could have led to more stability and an opportunity to put the house in order, if the KDP’s reaction had been different,” Agha explained.
“The agreement between the PUK and the Change movement requires that the KDP behave differently,” says Ribawar Karim Mahmoud, a professor of political science at the University of Sulaymaniyah. “But the KDP does not appear to be ready to abandon any of their powers or to share them with other parties.”
If things get worse rather than better as a result of the agreement, Mahmoud suggests, the region might see the administration of Iraqi Kurdistan split in two even more than it is today – currently the PUK and the KDP tend to rule over their own zones of influence. In reality, the semi-autonomous region is split between areas that traditionally fall under each party’s control, dubbed the “green” and “yellow” zones - after the colours of the parties’ flags – and they informally maintain total command over the armed forces in each respective zone.
Mahmoud has more warnings: “There could be a civil war and the two sides might even resort to the foreign powers that support them,” he says. “There are some people on both sides that actually want all this to happen.”
The political division in Iraqi Kurdistan is reflected in international alliances too, with the KDP closer to Turkey and the PUK, Iran. If political relationships break down further in Iraqi Kurdistan that would come at the same time as tensions in all of the Middle East are rising due to enmity between Turkey and Iran, among others.
“With regard to support from other countries, the situation is similar to what is happening with Iraq’s Sunni and Shiite Muslims,” argues Watheq al-Hashimi, the director of the Iraqi Group for Strategic Studies based in Baghdad. “If the two countries – Iran and Turkey – start to interfere, that would make things a lot worse.”
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