Kurdistan Region President Masoud Barzani visited Munich, Germany, on Friday, to participate in the annual Munich Security Conference.

The President and an accompanying KRG delegation attended the opening ceremony of the Conference and held a number of bilateral meetings, including meeting Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz, and Croatian Foreign Minister Vesna Pusic, and former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. In these meetings, the President shed light on the ongoing efforts by the peshmerga forces to defeat ISIS terrorists and the humanitarian situation of refugees and IDPS who fled to Kurdistan.

On the sidelines of the Conference, the President also took part in a roundtable meeting attended by a number of US and European politicians and officials. In this meeting, President Barzani talked about the fighting against ISIS and the need for more support for the peshmerga forces. He also discussed the plight of hundreds of thousands of refugees and IDPs who have fled to Kurdistan in recent months and years.

On the second day of his participation at the Munich Security Conference, President Barzani held meetings with a number of world leaders and officials, including with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini, Norway’s Foreign Minister Børge Brende, Germany’s Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen, Lebanese Prime Minister Tammam Salam, Armenia’s Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian.

Both German Chancellor Merkel and Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen commended the advances made by the peshmerga forces and reiterated that Germany would send further supplies to Kurdistan for the peshmerga.

The President also participated in a panel on the fight against ISIS terrorism and the situation of IDPS in Kurdistan. He thanked the international community for its support for the peshmerga forces but added that more military aid is needed.