Renowned singer Samira Saïd, who represented Morocco at the Eurovision Song Contest in 1980, has been chosen as the voice and face of Erbil for a music video celebrating the Kurdistan Region’s main city as the 2014 Tourism Capital of the Middle East. The song Erbil and its supporting video are out as from today to promote the town and its program of festivities.

In 2012, four cities, including Erbil in Iraq’s Kurdistan, Beirut in Lebanon, Taif in Saudi Arabia and Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates competed to win the title of 2014 capital, where Erbil would won after presenting a 10-minute documentary video in Cairo.

The song Erbil is about Kurdistan and the nature of the region. However, the video clip directed by the Lebanese director Fadi Haddad is not totally a patriotic one to appeal as much as possible, and also mainly because Samira Saïd is not Kurdish herself and is also making a music comeback of her own with the already successful album Mazel.