Sema
Senior officials from the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) have strongly condemned the Iraqi federal government’s suspension of salaries for employees in the Kurdistan Region, warning that such actions amount to collective punishment and will not go unanswered.
Hoshyar Zebari, a senior member of the KDP Political Bureau’s Executive Board, criticized the move in a post on the social media platform X, describing it as a deliberate act of political pressure by Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani’s government, which is backed by the Shia Coordination Framework.
“The collective punishment and starvation of the citizens of the Kurdistan Region under financial and administrative pretexts comes at a very unpleasant time and will not pass without consequences and punishment,” Zebari stated.
He added that this approach, coming just ahead of national elections, signals that the decision by the federal Ministry of Finance is not a mere technical matter but a “pre-planned” political attack on a constitutionally recognized region.
“We do not live in a city of dreams — Utopia — and our political history indicates that aggressors will be punished,” Zebari warned.
Echoing these sentiments, Khalida Khalil, spokesperson for the Barzani Headquarters, called the salary suspension a violation of basic rights.
“Turning employees’ salaries into a political weapon is a clear violation of human rights and even a crime against humanity,” Khalil wrote on X.
She described starvation as the most severe form of terrorism, targeting innocent civilians before combatants, and invoked the words of former Uruguayan President José Mujica: “History has taught us that any oppressive system that used the weapon of hunger eventually collapsed.”
The Kurdistan Region has seen mounting frustration over repeated delays and suspensions of public sector salaries, a crisis that Kurdish officials say is being used to exert political pressure on the Region.