Sony Music Company has dispelled claims circulated by Turkish media outlets that world-renowned singer Shakira will be performing in Kurdish. Media reports indicated on Monday that Shakira would perform a duet with Kurdish singer Hemin Xalid in remembrance of the massacre of 5,000 Kurds in the Iraqi Kurdish border town of Halabja in 1988. According to the Radikal daily, there is no such Kurdish singer named Hemin Xalid. Sony Music released a statement, CNN Türk reported, refuting all assertions and saying that Shakira has no such project planned.
The claims were based on news reports by media outlets in Iraq that stated Shakira would be singing in English, Kurdish and Spanish in a duet with Xalid, who is a US resident. According to the reports, Shakira planned to perform two Kurdish songs with an English part titled “This Time for Kurdistan.” Colombian singer-songwriter Shakira’s “Waka Waka This Time for Africa” was chosen as the official song for the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa.