Presidential candidate calls for TV debate with Barazani

SULAIMANIYA / IraqiNews.com: Kurdistan’s presidential candidate Hallow Ibrahim Ahmed on Sunday urged the region’s president, Massoud al-Barazani, to go head-to-head with him in a TV debate during their election campaigns. “The debate should outline the agenda of the candidates for the region’s presidency…,” Ahmed, who stands as a candidate for the Taqaddom List, told IraqiNews.com news agency. Ahmed said that the president’s agreement to hold the debate will represent “a significant step towards transparency and democracy in the Kurdistan region.” Born in 1951, Hallow is the son of a Kurdish political activist, Ibrahim Ahmed, and a brother-in-law of Iraqi President Jalal al-Talabani. In 1976, he joined the Kurdistan Toilers’ Party and immigrated to Europe, where he obtained his PhD in computer science from the Technical Institute at Stockholm. In 1991, he returned to the Kurdistan region and founded a number of student and civil society organizations. Presidential polls in Iraq’s Kurdistan are scheduled to take place on July 25. SS (P) 1