Muslim Brotherhood encourages Kurdish Islamic Union to participate in new government

01.11.2013 – Hemin Salih – BasNews (Erbil): Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) have allegedly encouraged the Kurdish Islamic Union (KIU) to participate in the new Kurdish government. KIU has rejected the claims.

According to Pan-Arab paper Asharq Al-Awsat the Muslim Brotherhood and the AKP have encouraged the KIU, one of the main Islamic party in Iraqi Kurdistan, to maintain close relations with the Islamic parties in Egypt and Turkey; the KIU denies this. “We are an independent party and we are not under the control of foreign forces, but we listen to anyone who gives us positive feedback,” AbuBakir Karwani, a member of the KIU political bureau, told BasNews. The Asharq Al-Awsat report also reveals that the AKP is in favor of KIU’s partnership with the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), the winner of last moth’s Kurdistan election.

Kurdish political parties have begun talks aimed at forming the new government, but the KDP has made it clear that they prefer to form the government with their old ally (the Patriotic Union of kurdistan) who they have ruled the region with for more than 22 years.

The Sep. 21st Kurdish parliamentary elections were won by the KDP, with Gorran movement in second (24 seats) and the PUK third (18 seats), KIU (10 seats) and the Kurdistan Islamic Group (KIG) (six seats).  – Read more: http://www.basnews.net/en/News/Details/Muslim-Brotherhood-encourages-Kurdish-Islamic-Union-to-participate-in-new-govern/4929