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Minister Falah Mustafa Bakir - Head of the Department of Foreign Relations
Minister Falah Mustafa Bakir was appointed as the first Head of the Department of Foreign Relations with ministerial rank in September 2006.
Born in the city of Erbil in 1964, he completed his undergraduate studies in English Language and Literature at the University of Mosul in 1986. He received a Masters degree in Development Studies in 1995 at the University of Bath in the United Kingdom, and completed the executive programme for senior managers in government at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government in 2001 in the United States of America.
Mr Bakir served as the Public Relations Officer of the Kurdistan Democratic Party from 1996 to 1999 and as the KRG Deputy Minister of Agriculture & Irrigation from 1999 to 2002. He was a Senior Adviser to KRG Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani from 2002 to 2004 when he was appointed Minister of State. He also served as the KRG’s liaison officer to the Coalition Provisional Authority in 2003 and to the Multi-National Forces Korean Contingent stationed in Erbil in 2004.
Having been tasked with creating the KRG Department of Foreign Relations (DFR) in 2006, Mr Bakir managed the Department through the duration of the 5th and 6th Cabinets of the KRG and is now serving in the 7th Cabinet as well.
He is a well-received lecturer and frequently represents the KRG at international conferences around the world. Being fluent in Kurdish, English and Arabic, he often delivers speeches at leading universities and think tanks abroad and appears regularly as a guest lecturer at the University of Salahaddin in Erbil.
Mr Bakir promotes and encourages scholarship and training programmes for the people of Kurdistan, and he works regularly with postgraduate students both locally and abroad.
He lives with his wife and their four children in Erbil, Kurdistan Region – Iraq.
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