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Opposition in Iraqi Kurdistan Questions Population Figures

Population growth and density have become a hot topic among the Iraqi Kurdistan Region's opposition parties, as changing figures will inevitably affect election outcomes.
An internally displaced Iraqi man shows his ink-stained finger to the media after voting at a polling centre during the country's provincial elections in Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, April 20, 2013. Iraqis voted for provincial councils on Saturday in their first ballot since U.S. troops left the country, a key measure of political strength before parliamentary elections next year. Iraqi politics are deeply split along sectarian lines with Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's government mired in c
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In the Iraqi Kurdistan Region, the Kurdish opposition — specifically the Movement for Change — is questioning the recent population increase, abnormal compared with that at the time of the parliamentary elections in 2009 in the region and in 2010 in Iraq.

The Movement for Change led by Mustafa Nushirwan, which split from Iraqi President Jalal Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) in 2008, is suspicious about the fact that this increase took place in Erbil and Dahuk, cities that are ruled by Massoud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP).

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