Najmiddin Karim

Governor Najmaldin Karim
Governor of Kirkuk
Incumbent
Assumed office 3 April 2011[1]
Deputy	Rakan Saeed al-Jobouri
Preceded by	Abdul Rahman Mustafa
Member of the Council of Representatives
Incumbent
Assumed office 7 March 2010
Constituency	Kirkuk
Personal details
Born	1949 (age 67–68) Kirkuk, Iraqi Kurdistan
Citizenship	Iraq United States
Political party	Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
Alma mater	George Washington University University of Mosul
Profession	Neurosurgeon Professor Governor
Military service
Service/branch	Peshmerga
Years of service	1972 - 1975

Dr. Najmaldin Karim (Kurdish: نەجمەدین کەریم‎) (born 1949) is the current governor of Kirkuk Governorate in Iraq. Prior to the invasion of Iraq Karim had served in numerous Kurdish and Iraqi opposition groups.

Early years

Karim was born in Kirkuk in 1949, and lived in Kirkuk until he completed secondary school, when upon he moved to Mosul, where he studied medicine at the Mosul Medical College. Karim became involved in politics at university, being elected to the leadership of the Kurdish Student Union in 1971, and then later joining the peshmerga in 1972.

Karim left Iraq in 1975. He later completed neurosurgery training at George Washington University, and started his own medical practice in the Washington, DC area. Karim became an American citizen and lived in The United States until 2009, when he returned to Kirkuk. Karim was in the emergency room when American President Ronald Reagan was shot in March 1981.^[2]

Return to Iraq

Karim returned to Iraq in 2009 to stand for the Kurdistan Alliance in the parliamentary election, and was elected as a member of parliament for Kirkuk. He was subsequently elected as governor of Kirkuk Governorate by Kirkuk's Governorate Council on 29 March 2011, and was sworn in on 3 April 2011.^[3]Dr. Karim was the head of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan's Kirkuk list in the 2014 general elections where he drew enormous support across ethnic groups with over 200,000 votes. This led to the Kurdish dominance in provincial representation. Dr. Karim's non-partisan work for all Kirkukis became evident at the polls.

Following President Jalal Talabani's stroke on December 17, 2012, Karim served as the head of Talabani's medical team when Talabani is in Iraq, although the majority of his medical treatment has been carried out in Germany.^[4]

Personal life

Karim has both Iraqi and American citizenship, and prior to his return to Iraq lived in The United States with his wife and family, where he ran his medical practice.^[5]

References