According to Kurdpress, the Iraqi Ministry of Planning, in response to the Kurdistan Regional Government, explained the reasons for the decrease in the region's population share from 14.14% to 12.68% of the total population of Iraq.

Abdul Zahra al-Handavi, the spokesperson of the Iraqi Ministry of Planning, announced in a statement: "Today, Wednesday, the advisory board of the Iraqi Ministry of Planning held a meeting under the chairmanship of Khalid Batal, the Minister of Planning (in acting capacity). One of the main points of this meeting was to examine the objections and considerations of the Kurdistan Regional Government regarding the method of calculating the population of the regional provinces in the general census of 2024.

He explained the reason for the decrease in the population of the Kurdistan Region in the 2024 census: "Based on the preliminary statistics, the population share of the Kurdistan Region was estimated at 14.14% of the total population of Iraq, but after removing the people who live in the region, but the cities and provinces of the region are not considered their main residence, this figure decreased to 12.68%."

The spokesperson of the Ministry of Planning also emphasized: "The population calculation was done based on pre-census agreements and at the request of the representatives of the Kurdistan Region, and in this context, people who live in the region but whose main residence is in other Iraqi provinces have been excluded from the population statistics of the region."