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"According to the Kurdistan Administration of Iraq's decree number 60, we decide to hoist the flag of Iraqi Kurdistan officially on all offices and government institutions in the Kurdistan region," a statement from Kurdish President Massud Barzani's office in Arbil said Friday.

The order said that "regions in Iraq's Kurdistan which have been hoisting the Baathist flag should lower it and hoist only the Kurdistan flag."

Iraq's Kurdish minority associates Iraq's red, white, and black banner with the ousted leader Saddam Hussein's hated Baath party, although it has been retained as the national flag by the post-Saddam government in Baghdad.

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