Barzani joins front as peshmerga approach Mosul
Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, has decided to stay close to the battlefield around Mosul Dam in northern Iraq to direct operations and encourage peshmerga fighters.
MOSUL DAM, Iraq — Near the Mosul Dam, at the foot of a mountain only 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) from the battle raging between the peshmerga forces and the Islamic State (IS), Kurdistan Regional Government President Massoud Barzani leads the battle from a simple caravan that is the closest point a military commander could get to his soldiers.
Barzani has left his political tasks in Erbil for the government to handle and decided to join the battle. His visitors are advised to wear heavy clothing, given the absence of a heating system at the Kurdish leader’s new headquarters. Barzani’s escorts told Al-Monitor that he was used to the cold since he hails from that environment. Barzani and his father, Mullah Mustafa Barzani, the leader of the Kurdish revolutionary movement, lived more difficult conditions in the remote mountains of northern Iraq when they led the fight against the regime of Saddam Hussein.
