Friday was the 49th anniversary of the execution of Kurdish activist Leyla Qasim who fought Kurdish rights. She was the first woman to be executed by the Ba'athist regime. Possibly the remembrance of the occasion made some inner-Kurdish divisions seem less important? Sinan Mahmoud (THE NATIONAL) reports:
The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), one of the main political parties in the autonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq,
ended its boycott of the region’s cabinet meetings on Sunday in a sign
of reconciliation with its rival, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP).
The
boycott by PUK senior leader Qubad Talabani began late last year, driven
by tensions between the PUK and KDP over power-sharing, parliamentary
elections law and sharing oil and gas revenue.
Mr
Talabani, Kurdistan's Deputy Prime Minister, and his six ministers
attended the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, the government said.
It comes a week after he met Kurdistan's Prime Minister Masrour Barzanii, when the pair agreed to co-operate through dialogue.
The
two sides have been under local and international pressure to reconcile
ahead of the region’s parliamentary elections scheduled for November.
The parties have jockeyed for power in the Kurdish region for decades.
MEMO adds:
The rifts had been a source of alarm to
Western countries, and especially the United States, which has backed
both factions, most recently in the fight against Islamic State.
The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan Party
(PUK) ministers returned to cabinet meetings for the first time since a
rare assassination in the city of Erbil in October last year, according
to three Kurdish government officials who spoke on condition of
anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.
Iraqi Kurdish Prime Minister Masrour
Barzani's ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) which has long tussled
for influence with its junior coalition partner in government, the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), led by the Talabani clan, have
largely kept a lid on mistrust since the war.
But the KDP blamed the PUK for the brazen
assassination of intelligence officer Hawker Abdullah Rasoul, triggering
a series of incidents that have strained the power-sharing arrangement.
The PUK has strongly denied the accusations, saying they are politically motivated.
In other news, Ali Mamouri (AL-MONITOR) reports:
Following a series of confrontations, it seems an open war has broken out between the Catholic Caledonian Church and the Christian political party and militia of Babylon Movement.
In
mid-April, an Iraqi court issued a summons for Cardinal Louis Sako,
patriarch and archbishop of Baghdad, in response to an accusation by an
Iraqi businessman affiliated with the Babylon Movement over a property
belonging to the church.
On April 29, Rayan al-Kaldani,
secretary-general of the Babylon Movement, accused Sako of interfering
in politics and damaging the reputation of the church.
In response, Sako held a lengthy video conference May 7, threatening
to internationalize the Christian issue if the Iraqi government failed
to take action against Kaldani.
The
Babylon Movement was founded in 2014 as a paramilitary group of
Christians who fought against the Islamic State (IS). It was later
integrated into the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) under the name of
the 50th Brigade.
The movement has been implicated in illegal land
seizures in Ninevah province and Baghdad, as well as several other
corruption cases, particularly in the Ministry of Immigration that has
been under their control since 2020.
Babylon was accused of
multiple human rights violations during its fight against IS, which
eventually led the United States to impose sanctions on Kaldani in 2019.
More than two hundred Christians gathered in Tahrir
Square, in the center of Baghdad, on the evening of Friday May 12, to
show their solidarity with Cardinal Louis Raphaƫl Sako, Patriarch of the
Chaldean Church, who became the subject of smear campaigns on social
media in recent weeks. The "solidarity demonstration", also included
nuns and priests who, like the others present, waved Iraqi flags,
candles, olive branches and banners bearing inscriptions calling on the
authorities to intervene to ensure that the electoral seats reserved for
Christians in the Iraqi parliament are not in fact occupied by groups
linked to the main parties.
Paul Rudnick. He has a new novel entitled FARRELL COVINGTON AND THE LIMITS OF STYLE. His first novel was the modern classic SOCIAL DISEASE. He's also written many screenplays including ADAMS FAMILY VALUES, IN & OUT, ISN'T SHE GREAT and been a script doctor on many other films (including FIRST WIVES CLUB). And he's also Libby Gelman-Waxner -- the film critic for PREMIERE magazine. I know Paul and this is from
the first part of a two-part interview that LGBTQ NATION has done with him:
LGBTQ NATION: One thread in the book is Nate’s pursuit of a “life in the theater,” based on movies like All About Eve and
the backstage machinations and glamorous parties portrayed in that
film. When did you say to yourself, “I am now a member of this tribe”?
Paul Rudnick: I had, early on in my life, a show on Broadway called I Hate Hamlet.
I was surrounded by terrific people. But there was also a certain level
of calamity attached to it because it starred Nicol Williamson, this
deranged, Olympic-caliber alcoholic who caused constant havoc, so it was
a wild ride.
It wasn’t until I worked on Jeffrey, which was my response
to living in New York during AIDS, that I really felt connected to the
theater, maybe because the play was turned down everywhere. Not a
theater in New York, a theater in the country would touch it. It was
considered far too gay. It was considered somehow “a comedy about AIDS.”
It had all these red flags attached to it, or pink flags attached to
it. And we ended up with this just amazing cast of people who just
wanted to be there.
And also at that time, in New York and elsewhere, theatre became more
essential than ever because there was so little media coverage of the
AIDS crisis. You know, it wasn’t on television. It wasn’t in The New York Times. Theater was all we had. So when I would go see The Normal Heart, Angels in America, Jerker,
so many great gay plays, that was the only place to get basic
information about what was going on. It was a period of such heightened
grief and panic, but also of real comradeship, that we were all in this
together, and those plays were kind of town halls.
So Jeffrey was, because it was the first thing I’d ever
written that didn’t embarrass me, that I didn’t think, “I should be much
better at this” — and also, I was working with people I just adored,
with a cast and director, designers, people I just cherished, and no one
was there for the money because we weren’t making any money, and the
play was supposed to run for three weeks and that was it, and then went
on to have a much larger life — but that was the moment where I
experienced the best form of theatrical glamour, the greatest emotion
and the greatest appreciation of that community. I would not wish that
on anyone, because it involved so much tragedy, but on the other hand, I
cherished the connections that were made.
There’s a scene in the book of going to a sort of first show business
party in a beautiful apartment on the Upper West Side. There is a magic
to that, the first moment when you realize, “Okay, this world I’ve
always dreamed of, these celebrities I’ve always followed, these artists
I’ve always admired: They’re real, and I can be introduced to them, and
I can embarrass myself in front of them.”
It’s a very special part of anyone’s sentimental education in theater
and in the arts, where you say, “Oh, that’s what a producer looks like.
That’s how a director treats an actor.” So it was thrilling, and
horribly depressing, also, because, especially when you’re younger,
everything is much worse and everything is much more exciting.
Everything revolves around you.
LGBTQ NATION: In Italy, Nate hosts a journalist that
represents the latest generation of gay youth. You call them Sten, and
they’re ngc, or non-gender conforming. At one point Nate confides, “I
refrained from asking Sten if their preferred pronoun was ‘bitch.'”
PR: Sten is a tough cookie, which I enjoy because
it’s a conversation that I’ve had many times now. And I think the most
important thing on both sides of any generational divide is to listen.
Even if you think the other people are old, or young and stupid, and
prejudiced and wrongheaded, pay attention, because there will be
something of value that everyone usually has to offer. You have to stay
open and you have to stay curious. Otherwise, you’re going to miss the
best time, and also you’re going to miss the world’s evolution.
And that’s what’s going on when you talk to young queer people, or
whatever they choose to call themselves. They’re amazing. Every
generation wants to find something that will upset their parents, and
from earlier times, it was hair, music, clothes, you name it. And I
think for the current generation, pronouns have been the ticket, and I
applaud them. I think it’s wonderful, because — to use a Gen Z word —
it’s been such a trigger for older people.
I find it endlessly entertaining, because you think, why would anyone
find that such a burden, or an ordeal, to actually acknowledge someone
in the way they’d like to be acknowledged? I always think that’s the
rule: Call people what they’d like to be called. And that’s what Nate
deals with. Also because he’s been challenged. He’s been told, “You’re
an old gay person, you’re over. You have nothing to teach us.” Sometimes
all of that is true, but sometimes it’s not.
And here's a recent Tweet from Paul.
