The political scene in Iraqi Kurdistan over the past two weeks can be summed up in three politically significant developments that have dealt heavy blows to the region’s already fragile democratic process.
The first event was the arrest of Shaswar Abdulwahid, head of the opposition New Generation Movement, on August 12, 2025, from his home in Sulaymaniyah. The city is controlled by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) led by Bafel Talabani, who is the son of the late former Iraqi president Jalal Talabani. According to PUK-affiliated media, the warrant for her arrest was issued on August 3, 2025, following lawsuits the private citizens had filed against Abdulwahid under Article 431 of the Iraqi Penal Code, which relates to “defamation.”
A few days later, in Erbil- the capital of the Kurdistan Region, which is controlled by Masoud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP)- a court added four years and five months to the sentence of Sherwan Sherwani for allegedly “threatening” a prison officer.
Sherwani had originally been supposed to be released on September 9, after serving nearly five years behind bars. According to his defense team, plainclothes armed men physically assaulted members of Sherwani’s family and the two members of parliament who were present at the trial.
The third event was a large-scale military operation launched in the residential neighborhoods of central Sulaymaniyah. At dawn on Friday, August 22, security and military forces conducted an extensive raid on the compound of Lahur Sheikh Jangi, the former co-president of the PUK alongside his cousin Bafel Talabani. The operation, which lasted more than three hours and involved the use of heavy weaponry, including suicide drones, ended with the arrest of Lahur and the gunmen who were with him.
These are the most striking developments shaping the Kurdish political landscape today, without delving into speculative questions that seem misplaced amid such a volatile moment. Questions, for example, about whether Shaswar Abdulwahid truly embodies opposition values against the entrenched dominance of the two ruling parties, or whether he is merely another replica of the same political mold. Or whether Lahur Sheikh Jangi was indeed plotting a major conspiracy — allegedly with help from insiders and outsiders — to oust Bafel and Qubad Talabani, or even assassinate them, as some of his opponents claim.
Perhaps the only event that leaves no room for ambiguity is the additional sentence against journalist Sherwani, a known critic of what he describes as pervasive corruption within the region’s governing institutions.
The oft-touted “democracy” that Kurdish politicians have proudly boasted of since 1991 now faces a serious threat. That does not mean the region ever truly enjoyed a democratic system built on pluralism and respect for freedoms. In fact, Iraqi Kurdistan (fragile and exposed, surrounded by Arab, Persian, and Turkish powers) has long had an illusory democratic framework.
Democracy in the Kurdistan Region has mostly been reduced to a formality: elections are marred by interference from the two ruling parties, parliament is frequently paralyzed, and the media landscape dominated by partisan outlets. These patterns, repeatedly flagged by independent organizations, undermine the essence of true democratic practice and principles in the region’s political system and executive institutions.
Since their descent from the mountains into the cities in 1991, Kurdish leaders have consistently neglected a key principle of democracy: preventing the emergence of a political monopoly and fostering political and social space grounded in pluralism. Instead, the dominant forces in the Kurdistan Region have clung to their private militias that critics argue are maintained less for defending the region (as the partisan discourse insists it does) and more for settling internal scores. Even after more than three decades since the formation of the first Kurdish government in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan has yet to build a unified Peshmerga force.
True democracy is built on institutional mechanisms that are designed, above all, to prevent any individual or group from monopolizing “truth” and imposing it on society through coercion or violence. A democratic system only begins to function when multiple, even conflicting, visions of reality can coexist in the same sociopolitical space.
This is the lesson Kurdish political elites must urgently learn: pluralism; they cannot monopolize governance and leadership.
