CRI听力:Iraqi Kurds Prepare Independence Referendum

The president of Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region is asking its parliament to plan a referendum on Kurdish independence.

Massoud Barzani has asked lawmakers to form a committee to organize a referendum on independence and pick a date for the vote.

"The time has come for us to determine our own fate and we must not wait for others to determine it for us."

This comes as Baghdad continues fighting to repel Sunni insurgents and struggles to form a new government.

Earlier this week, Kurdish and Sunni lawmakers walked out of the newly-elected Iraqi parliament's first session following an inability by the Shi'ite majority to nominate a prime minister.

Iraq's five million Kurds have governed themselves autonomously since the end of the first Gulf War in 1991.

Amid the Sunni insurgency, Kurdish fighters have been able to expanded their territory by as much as 40 percent.

Kurdish groups in northern Iraq, Iran and southern Turkey have been fighting for decades to have their own independent homeland.