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BAGHDAD, Oct. 29-- The President of the semi-autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan Masoud Barzani on Sunday told a closed-door session of parliament that he was stepping down from his post on Nov. 1, local media reported. "I refuse to continue the position of president of the Kurdish region after Nov. 1," Rudaw Kurdish media said, quoting a letter sent by Barzani to the regional parliament session held in the regional capital Erbil. "Changing the law on the presidency of Kurdistan or prolonging the presidential term is not acceptable," Barzani said. He said that a meeting must be held as soon as possible so that "there will be no legal vacuum in the duties of the president of the region." However, Barzani pledged to continue his long mission as a Peshmerga "to sacrifice and struggle for the rights and demands of our people as well as preserve the achievements of our people," the letter read. Barzani set Nov. 1 as the date for stepping down and asked the parliament to vote on distributing the legal, military and administrative powers of the president to the regional government, parliament and the judiciary. The parliament continued its session after Barzani's letter and voted in favor of choosing the current regional Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani for Commander-in-Chief of Kurdish regional forces. Masoud Barzani's president post has sparked controversy, as his tenure was originally expired in 2013, but the Kurdish parliament extended his term to August 2017, but because of the blitzkrieg, or lighting war, of the Islamic State (IS), Barzani remained in office. | 
