President joins Christmas celebrations in Sulaimaniya

SULAIMANIYA / IraqiNews.com: Iraqi President Jalal al-Talabani on Thursday attended Christmas celebrations at the Mar Yousef Church in the northern city of Sulaimaniya. “President Talabani congratulated Christians on Christmas and the New Year,” a source close to Talabani told IraqiNews.com. The modern city of Sulaimaniya, 364 kilometers north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, was founded in 1748 by a Kurdish prince known as Ibrahim Pasha Baban who named it for his father Sulaiman Pasha. Since being founded as the capital of a powerful Kurdish principality it has grown to about 1,800,000 people. Sulaimaniya, known as Zamwa prior to its founding, is the cultural center of the Sorani-speaking Kurds and an important economic centre for Iraqi Kurdistan. SS (P) 1