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KDP and Kurdistan mourn first Speaker of Parliament Jawhar Namiq Salim
Erbil, Kurdistan - Iraq (KDP.info) – The Kurdistan Democratic Party and other political parties today in Erbil mourned the death of Jawhar Namiq Salim, the first Speaker of the Kurdistan Parliament. His body was repatriated today from Sweden to his homeland, and a ceremony was held at the Kurdistan Parliament in his honour.
Jawhar Namiq Salim died on March 21 at the age of 65 in Stockholm. The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) conveys its sincere condolences to his family and friends. We mourn the loss of a leading figure in the KDP who was both a Peshmerga and a nation-builder.
Masoud Barzani, President of the Kurdistan Region and of the KDP, together with Kurdistan’s leaders and senior political figures and family members today received the remains of Jawhar Namiq at Erbil International Airport. A guard of honour stood to attention and saluted the coffin, which was draped in the 21-pointed sun flag of Kurdistan and adorned with flowers.
Later at the Kurdistan Parliament, tributes were paid by veterans and leaders of Kurdistan’s many political parties and movements, including the current Speaker of the Kurdistan Parliament Dr Kamal Kirkuki and Deputy President of the KDP and former Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani.
Wakes in honour of the late Jawhar Namiq will be organised in Kurdistan as well as by Kurdish communities abroad.
The KDP and all the people of Kurdistan grieve the loss of this leader who was renowned for his patriotism and his commitment to his people and homeland.
Jawhar Namiq was born in 1946 in Kalar and graduated from the Department of Economics of Al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad. He became famous as a Peshmerga freedom fighter in the Kurdish uprisings known as the September (Aylul) Revolution that began in 1961 and the Gulan (May) Revolution from 1976. In 1975, he joined the KDP’s interim leadership.
At the KDP’s 10th conference in 1989, he was elected to the party’s Politburo and led Kurdish forces in Kirkuk for the Kurdistan Front, an umbrella group of Kurdistan’s political parties, in the 1991 Uprising against the Baathist regime.
On June 4th 1992, at the Kurdistan Parliament’s first session following historic elections, Jawhar Namiq was elected by MPs as the first Speaker of Parliament. He played a major role in the parliament’s passage of new legislation and amendments to Ba’athist-era laws. Under his speakership, on 3 October 1992 the parliament announced that Kurdistan wanted to live under a federal system in Iraq. Laws on freedom of the media and publishing were passed, and Ba’athist-era censorship was lifted.
After the KDP’s 11th conference in 1993, Jawhar Namiq was elected as Secretary of the party’s Politburo. He died in Sweden, where he went to receive medical treatment for an illness.
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