The 160-article document will be debated and amended ahead of a December 1 parliamentary vote by the Kurdish autonomous region's parliament.

According to Article Two, Iraq's Kurdish region consists of the three current provinces of Dohuk, Arbil and Sulaimaniyah, but also Kirkuk province and parts of Diyalah, Nineveh and Wasit provinces.

"The populations of these areas were taken from Kurdistan and when they are returned to Kurdistan, they will benefit from the same rights given to them by the federal constitution," stated the article.

Large numbers of Sunni Arabs, Turkmen and Shiites live in these areas and have not expressed an interest in being part of the Kurdish autonomous region.

The official languages of the region are Arabic and Kurdish and the population is recognized to include Turkmens, Chaldeans, Assyrians, Armenians, Kurds and Arabs.

The constitution goes on to state that the Kurds have "chosen a liberal federation with Iraq as long as it respects the federal constitution, its federal, democratic and multiparty parliament."

The Kurds reserve the right to review this choice should the federal constitution be violated, particularly the democratic or human rights aspects, or if a federal constitution article allowing a referendum for the future of Kirkuk is not respected.

The Kurdish national flag will hang in government offices side by side with the Iraqi federal flag (which has yet to be redrawn), stated the draft. Currently the Kurdish regional president, Mahmud Barzani, has banned the display of Iraq's old national flag.

While the constitution bans the existence of militias, it recognizes the historic Kurdish guerilla force of peshmergas as "the regular forces to protect and defend the region".