Kurdistan's Barzani Family Spends $47 Million on Two Beverly Hills Homes

Kurdistan's Barzani Family Spends $47 Million on Two Beverly Hills Homes

For centuries, the Barzani family have been the de facto rulers of the Middle East’s autonomous Kurdistan region, currently based the mountains north of Baghdad, Iraq. Though Kurdistan exists strictly as an imaginary country, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has its own legislature, army and foreign policy, essentially making it a state in all but name. And the Barzanis’ influence among the Kurds is so great that supporters and critics alike have coined the cheeky nickname Barzanistan for the oil-rich region. From 2005 to 2017, Masoud Barzani served as president of the KRG, during which time he established himself as one of the U.S.’s staunchest allies in the Middle East.

Barzani’s tenure as president was also marred by controversy. Critics alleged that he and his family secretly held a virtual monopoly on various commercial businesses, reaping tens of billions from their telecommunications empire and other endeavors. Though Barzani himself denied any involvement with commercial enterprises, a local newspaper accused Barzani and his Kurdistan Democratic Party of collecting large profits from illegal oil smuggling into Iran. And a $47 million purchase of Beverly Hills real estate by his sons could be construed as providing evidence of some form of corruption.

But stories of the Barzani sons’ vast wealth are nothing new. Though he’s publicly issued a denial, avid real estate watchers widely believe that Masrour Barzani was the anonymous buyer of a gigantic mansion in McLean, Virginia, that ranks as one of the largest homes in the entire state. (The ornate house, immodestly christened Chateau Noble de McLean, bears an almost eerie resemblance to Maison 613 and Foothill Manor.) And if local reports are to be believed, Mansour Barzani once lost $3.2 million in a single night while gambling at a Dubai casino.