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92 Percent of Kurds Voted ‘Yes’ for Independence from Iraq
The Independent High Elections and Referendum Commission of Kurdistan said ‘Yes’ vote scored 92.73 percent, compared to only 7.27 of ‘No’ vote.
The commission previously stated that the turnout for Monday’s referendum was 72.16 percent.
The result came after Iraq’s parliament authorized the prime minister, Haidar al-Abadi, to send troops into areas disputed between Arabs and Kurds that were contentiously included in the ballot.
Baghdad has pledged to close Kurdish airspace at 6pm on Friday and Turkey says it is considering whether to shut its frontier with Kurdistan and impose a trade ban.
Massoud Barzani, the de facto president of the region’s Kurds, had hoped to transition strong support for the poll into political leverage that could eventually help negotiate independence from Iraq.
With inputs from the guardian and Iraqi News.