Nawshirwan Mustafa

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Nawshirwan Mustafa
Nawshirwan with Peshmerga forces.
Former - Deputy Secretary General PUK
In office March 1, 1975 – December 5, 2006
Preceded by	Jalal Talabani
Succeeded by	Jalal Talabani

Born	1944 Sulaimaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan
Political party	Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
Residence	Sulaimaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan
Religion	Sunni Muslim

Nawshirwan Mustafa (Kurdish: Newşîrwan Mistefa)(born 1944) is a prominent Kurdish politician and scholar. He was the co-founder and until December 2006 the deputy secretary general of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), one of the two leading political parties in Iraqi Kurdistan and Iraq in general.

1 Biography
2 Military career
3 Current Affairs
4 Books
5 See also
6 References

[edit] Biography

Nawshirwan Mustafa was born in 1944 in Sulaimaniyah City in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Nawshirwan has attended universities in Baghdad and Vienna. He studied Political Science and International Law.

Nawshirwan returned to Sulaimaniyah and was editor of the Kurdish weekly newspaper "Rizgary" (Kurdish for Salvation) a weekly journal set up in the brief lull in hostilities between the central Iraqi government and its Kurdish population. During this period he and several other Kurdish intellectuals formed a secret nationalist party named Komala. He was exiled soon after for involvement in Kurdish politics. Mustafa was in his final year of studies in Vienna when the Barzani rebellion collapsed, after talks with Jalal Talabani, they decided that a new Kurdish movement needed to be organized. He made his way to Damascus where a number of meetings between prominent Kurdish politicians about the future of the Kurdish resistance were taking place. The result of these meeting was the foundation of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, At the meeting it was announced that Jalal Talalbani would become the secretary general and Nawshirwan the deputy Secretary general. in an understanding between the two leaders it was decided that Nawshirwan would lead and organize the movement in Kurdistan while Talabani would publicize and champion the cause outside Kurdistan. Following his return, Mustafa quickly became a leading light of the Komalai Ranjdaran grouping (a forerunner of the modern day PUK) and became general secretary of this organization, before taking part in the negotiations which led to the merging of the Komala with the Shoresh Garan grouping of current Iraqi president Jalal Talabani and the formation of the PUK.

On the 5th of December 2006, Mr Nawshirwan Mustafa resigned from his post as the deputy leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). His resignation came as his deep reformist agenda was blocked by the Iraqi president and the leader of the PUK, Jalal Talabani. He is currently planning to create an independent Kurdish media center in the city of Suleimani in Southern Kurdistan (Iraqi Kurdistan).

[edit] Military career

A military commander as well as a political figure, Mustafa is a respected figure amongst the Kurdish people for his years of servitude, courage and tactical prowess in battle against the Ba'thist forces of Saddam. Mustafa both organized and lead the majority of the Kurdish resistance from its beginning in 1976 and was the most senior member of the PUK in Iraqi Kurdistan in the 1991 uprising which followed Iraq's defeat in the first Gulf war. As such, he took charge of the war of liberation fought by the Kurdish people, which involved the liberation of the Kurdish population centers of northern Iraq including Kirkuk (being recognized as the architect of the Raparin - the term given to the 1991 Kurdish uprising which led to the creation of the safe haven in Iraqi Kurdistan and subsequently autonomy). Following the 1991 uprising Mustafa resigned from his post as Secretary General of Komala, and dissolved the Komala wing of the PUK (which compiled over 95% of the PUK membership) to increase the unity within the PUK and allow for the transition of power from the Peshmerga (the military wing of the PUK) to the civilian population. Mustafa was then able to return to his initial career and began to organize Kurdish academia and wrote several books, while maintaining his political profile.

[edit] Current Affairs

Nawshirwan Mustafa in 2007

Currently Mustafa is an independent Kurdish politician and writer living in the city of Suleimani in Kurdistan. In 2005-2006, he started a process of reform in the electoral system of PUK aiming to increase democracy within the party, end nepotism and to both allow and encourage the younger generation of Kurds to become actively involved in Kurdish politics. However due to differences and strong resistance from other factions of the PUK, especially that of Jalal Talabani, the process of reform failed. Consequently Mustafa resigned from his post and is working along new paths to implement reform within Kurdistan and Kurdish politics, and end the current reign of corruption and nepotism.^[1] After the recent scare over Jalal Talabanis health, Nawshirwan Mustafa has been recognized as the only feasible successor for the position of secretary general of the PUK (Patriotic Union of Kurdistan).

[edit] Books

"Kurds and Ejams"

A political history of Iranian Kurds

Published in: 1992

"From the Danaube shore to the Nawzang valley

political events in Iraq Kurdistan from (1975-1978)

Published in: 1997

"The fingers which break each other."

Political events in Iraqi Kurdistan (1978-1983)

Published in: 1997
Discusses the often treacherous nature of contemporary Kurdish politics.

"Going around in circles."

The inside story of events in Iraqi Kurdistan (1984-1988)

Published in: 1998
An account of the diplomacy of the Kurdish liberation movement in the 1980s. A period in which Saddam Hussein launched the genocidal Anfal campaign against the Kurds. ISBN 3980614034

"The Government of Kurdistan" (22 January - 17 December 1946)

Kurd's in the Soviet game.

Published in: 1993
A historical account of the short lived Kurdish republic of Mehabad. ISBN 9090063560

"The emirate of Baban between the grinding stones of the Persians and Turks"

Published in: 1998
A historical account of the early Kurdish principality of Baban (1500-1850), A frontier principality between the Ottoman and Safavid empires, which was a microcosm of the power struggles of the great Middle Eastern empires.