Massoud Barazani

Massoud Barazani, who served as a member of the Iraqi Governing Council beginning in July 2003, was listed with the Kurdistani Gathering with Jalal Talabani "and a few other parties" for the December 15, 2005, Iraqi national elections. [1][2]

Barazani, a Kurdistan Democratic Party (Sunni Kurd), "led the KDP through decades of conflict with the Iraqi central government and with local rivals, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. He commands tens of thousands of armed militia fighters, known as peshmerga, and controls a large area of north-western Iraq." [3]