The Armenian Assembly of America (Assembly) salutes Iraqi Kurdistan’s referendum on independence and its results, where the people voted for three provinces of northern Iraq to become part of the sovereign Iraqi Kurdistan.

As it was noted, Iraqi Kurds cast ballots in a controversial independence referendum Monday as tensions between Iraq's largest ethnic minority and the Iraqi government in Baghdad intensified. The first results should be known within 72 hours. 

“Iraq has been beset by war for generations now, and this peaceful expression of free will from the people of Iraqi Kurdistan should be respected as a basic human right to help create a better future for the Kurds and all the other groups in the region, including the Christian and other minorities,” Assembly Co-Chairs Anthony Barsamian and Van Krikorian said, Armenian Assembly of America reported.

“This type of expression of popular will demands that we respect the process, and democracies should be supporting peaceful exercises of self-determination consistent with universal human rights in and similar to Iraqi Kurdistan,” they added.

The Kurdish people have treated Armenians who reside within its territory in Iraq well throughout the years. “There are just a few of us in Kurdistan. But thanks to God, we have been given most of our rights,” Ishkhan Milko, an Armenian member of the Duhok Provincial Council, told Rudaw, “We have a seat in the Kurdistan parliament as well as a seat in the Duhok Provincial Council.”

Many Armenians ended up in northern Iraq as a result of deportations during the 1915 Armenian Genocide. Even though some Kurdish communities were exploited and encouraged by the Turkish Ottoman regime to attack the caravans of Armenians, many Kurds refused and instead rescued them from death.