Iraq endorses plan to remove Arabs from Kirkuk

This is bound to create more ethnic conflict and complaints from Turkey. This is an area that could see a great deal of violence break out.



Iraq endorses contentious plan to relocate Arabs from oil-rich northern city of Kirkuk





By Steven R. Hurst
ASSOCIATED PRESS

12:45 p.m. March 31, 2007

BAGHDAD – Iraq's government has endorsed plans to relocate thousands of Arabs who were moved to Kirkuk as part of Saddam Hussein's campaign to force ethnic Kurds out of the oil-rich city, in an effort to undo one of the former dictator's most enduring and hated policies.
The contentious decision was confirmed Saturday by Iraq's Sunni justice minister as he told The Associated Press he was resigning. Almost immediately, opposition politicians said they feared it would harden the violent divisions among Iraq's fractious ethnic and religious groups and possibly lead to an Iraq divided among Kurds, Sunni Arabs and Shiites.



AdvertisementThe plan was virtually certain to anger neighboring Turkey, which fears a northward migration of Iraqi Kurds – and an exodus of Sunni Arabs – will inflame its own restive Kurdish minority.
At least 36 people were killed in a series of bombings and attacks around the country, including nine construction workers who died when gunmen opened fire on their bus south of Kirkuk. The deaths capped a week in which more than 500 people were killed in sectarian violence.

Kirkuk, an ancient city that once was part of the Ottoman Empire, has a large minority of ethnic Turks as well as Christians, Shiite and Sunni Arabs, Armenians and Assyrians. The city is just south of the Kurdish autonomous zone stretching across three provinces of northeastern Iraq.

Iraq's constitution sets an end-of-the-year deadline for a referendum on Kirkuk's status. Since Saddam's fall four years ago, thousands of Kurds who once lived in the city have resettled there. It is now believed Kurds are a majority of the population and that a referendum on attaching Kirkuk to the Kurdish autonomous zone would pass easily.

Justice Minister Hashim al-Shebli said the Cabinet agreed on Thursday to a study group's recommendation that Arabs who had moved to Kirkuk from other parts of Iraq after July 1968 should be returned to their original towns and paid compensation.

Al-Shebli, who had overseen the committee on Kirkuk's status, said relocation would be voluntary. Those who choose to leave will be paid about $15,000 and given land in their former hometowns.

“There will be no coercion and the decision will not be implemented by force,” al-Shebli told The Associated Press.

Tens of thousands of Kurds and non-Arabs fled Kirkuk in the 1980s and 1990s when Saddam's government implemented its “Arabization” policy. Kurds and non-Arabs were replaced with pro-government Arabs from the mainly Shiite impoverished south.

After the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, Kurds and other non-Arabs streamed back, only to find their homes were either sold or given to Arabs. Some of the returning Kurds found nowhere to live except in parks and abandoned government buildings. Others drove Arabs from the city, despite pleas from Sunni and Shiite leaders for them to stay.

Adil Abdul-Hussein Alami, a 62-year-old Shiite who moved to Kirkuk 23 years ago in return for $1,000 and a free piece of land, said he would find it hard to leave.

“Kirkuk is an Iraqi city and I'm Iraqi,” said the father of nine. “We came here as one family and now we are four. Our blood is mixed with Kurds and Turkmen.”

But Ahmed Salih Zowbaa, a 52-year-old Shiite father of six who moved to the city from Kufa in 1987, agreed with the government's decision. “We gave our votes to this government and constitution and as long as the government will compensate us, then there is no injustice at all,” he said.

There were fears that a referendum that was likely to put Kirkuk, 180 miles north of Baghdad, under Kurdish control could open a new front in the violence that has ravaged Iraq since shortly after the U.S.-led invasion. On March 19, several bombs struck targets in Kirkuk and killed at least 26 people.

Al-Shebli, a Sunni Arab, also confirmed he had offered his resignation on the same day that the Cabinet approved the plan. He cited differences with the government and his own political group, the secular Iraqi List, which joined Sunni Arab lawmakers Saturday in opposing the Kirkuk decision.

He said he would continue in office until the Cabinet approved his resignation.

The Iraqi List is led by former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite. The group holds 25 seats in the 275-seat parliament.

Ali al-Dabbagh, spokesman for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, said al-Shebli quit before he could be fired in a coming government reshuffle. Neither al-Dabbagh nor al-Shebli would say if the minister had resigned over the Kirkuk issue.

In late February, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Iraq should delay the Kirkuk referendum because the city was not secure.

Turkey fears Iraq's Kurds want Kirkuk's oil revenues to fund an eventual bid for independence that could encourage separatist Kurdish guerrillas in Turkey, who have been fighting for autonomy since 1984. That conflict has claimed the lives of 37,000 people.

Al-Shebli said local authorities in Kirkuk would begin distributing forms soon to Arab families to determine who would participate in the relocation program. He said he could not predict how long the process would take.

Planning Minister Ali Baban said the relocation plan was adopted over the opposition of Sunni Arab members of the Shiite-led government, members of the Iraqi List and at least one Cabinet minister loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

“We demanded that the question of Kirkuk be resolved through dialogue between the political blocs and not through the committee,” he told the AP earlier this week. “They say the repatriation is voluntary, but we have our doubts.”

Osama al-Nujaifi, a Sunni lawmaker with the Iraqi List, also denounced the decision, saying it fails to address key issues, including how to deal with property claims.

“There are more than 13,000 unsolved cases before the commission in charge of this point and it just solved no more than 250 of them,” he said of the property claims. “The other thing is the huge demographic change in Kirkuk as more than 650,000 Kurds have been brought in illegally over the past four years. We contest these resolutions and we will raise to the parliament to be discussed.”

Kurdish militia in Kirkuk

While the US concentrates on Baghdad things are building up for a blowup in Kirkuk. Not much attention seems to be paid to what is happening there.


In Iraq, Kurdish militia has the run of oil-rich Kirkuk
By Tom Lasseter
McClatchy Newspapers

An Iraqi soldier rides in the back of a truck in convoy of Peshmerga milita and Iraqi army soldiers in Kirkuk, in the Kurdistan region of Iraq. (Tom Lasseter/MCT)
More photos
Corruption, incompetence plague Iraqi forces, reporter finds
Mahdi Army gains strength through unwitting aid of U.S.
Soldiers in Iraq view troop surge as a lost cause

KIRKUK, Iraq - Lt. Hiwa Raouf Abdul is not supposed to be in Kirkuk. The oil-rich city, which many fear is teetering on the brink of civil war, is off-limits to Kurdish Peshmerga militia members.


And yet, on Tuesday, the slender, 26-year-old Peshmerga officer breezed through one checkpoint after the next on his way into Kirkuk, exchanging waves and salutes with Iraqi army soldiers and policemen as he rode with a truckload of Peshmerga gunmen.


Abdul is stationed in the nearby Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah, where the Peshmerga enforce strict security through a series of checkpoints, and his visit to Kirkuk came only because his commanders asked him to escort a reporter there.


But the ease with which a pickup truck carrying seven Peshmerga members, most of them wielding AK-47s, passed into Kirkuk says volumes about the challenge of pacifying flashpoint towns like Kirkuk and, ultimately, Iraq.


When he passed by the Iraqi army checkpoint on the edge of Kirkuk, Abdul looked at the soldiers saluting him and said, "They get their orders from the Iraqi army, but their loyalty is to the Kurds, to us."


As with Shiite militias in Baghdad, the line between militia members and Iraqi security troops in Kirkuk is so thin that it at times doesn't exist. And U.S. plans to build Iraq's security forces - a process that has cost more than $15 billion nationwide - seem to have strengthened militias instead of discouraging them.


The issue of loyalty with Iraqi security forces is proving to be the Achilles' heel of American plans to stabilize the war-torn nation. Without neutral Iraqi soldiers and police, an American withdrawal would almost certainly lead to greater sectarian bloodshed than Iraq is currently experiencing.




In June 2004, the American Coalition Provisional Authority issued an order outlawing militias and calling for their members to integrate into Iraq's security forces. An exemption was made for the Peshmerga, provided that they remained in Kurdistan, a semi-autonomous state in northern Iraq, and not move to outside areas like Kirkuk.


Armed groups across Iraq reacted to the 2004 measure by enlisting in the army and police and maintaining large contingents of stand-alone militia groups, making them significantly more powerful.




Kirkuk is a tinderbox of sects vying for control of an area with billions of dollars worth of oil, but the Iraqi army isn't a neutral presence, and many of its soldiers make no secret that their loyalty is to the Kurdish nation.


"I joined to defend my city and my people, who are Peshmerga," said Iraqi Army Pvt. Kamaran Ahmed, a 31-year-old Kurd from Kirkuk. "From the time of the first prophet God sent to Earth, Kirkuk has been a part of Kurdistan and it will return to Kurdistan."


Ahmed continued: "If it is not returned to Kurdistan, things will get very bad."


To make his point clear, Ahmed jutted his arm into the air and said, "For instance, I have this watch on my wrist. If you take it from me, I will do whatever is necessary to take it back."


American and Iraqi officials are adamant that Iraqi troops are heading in the right direction.


Asked by e-mail whether there were concerns about the Peshmerga influence on Iraqi troops around Kirkuk, U.S. Lt. Col. Michael Donnelly answered: "No. Our relationship with the IA (Iraqi Army) division is well established since our arrival here six months ago."


Donnelly, a spokesman for the 25th Infantry Division, which is responsible for Kirkuk, continued: "When the soldiers join the IA, they are taught in training and in day-to-day regimen of being a soldier that sectarian lines are not for the army. They are an army of one, if you will, for one nation."


Requests for comment from four senior U.S. military public affairs officers in Baghdad were unsuccessful.


The dispute over who will ultimately control Kirkuk, which has oil fields with reserves of at least 8.7 billion barrels, is a contentious and potentially catastrophic one, with the city's Arab, Kurd and Turkmen communities all claiming rightful ownership.


"The Kurds who surround Kirkuk claim to be Iraqi army, but their extensive presence on the outskirts of Kirkuk is designed to affect the ethnic balance of the city," said Ali Mahdi, a senior Turkmen political leader in Kirkuk and a member of the provincial council. "They are protecting their sect and working for the benefit of the Kurds in the city and not the others. This is dangerous for the future of the city."


The situation has serious geo-political implications: Neighboring Turkey, a crucial U.S. ally, fears that the Kurds will eventually declare independence if they gain Kirkuk, a move that could lead the large Kurdish population in Turkey to agitate for secession.


Former dictator Saddam Hussein displaced tens of thousands of Kurdish families from Kirkuk, replacing them with Arabs, mainly from the Shiite south.


Iraq's constitution provides for a referendum to decide the matter of who will control Kirkuk by the end of this year; meanwhile, tens of thousands of Kurds have moved into the city since 2003, urged by Kurdish political parties to set up homes there.


And the Peshmerga have continued to have deep ties with the Iraqi security forces.




"If the heavy presence of Peshmerga in Kirkuk and its outskirts continues as it is now, it will lead to a civil war in Kirkuk," said Abdullah al Obeidi, a Sunni Arab tribal leader and a member of the Kirkuk provincial council.




After bringing a McClatchy reporter into Kirkuk, the Peshmerga - literally, "those who face death" - troops next stopped at an Iraqi army base there.


Iraqi army Maj. Shawqi Mohammed, a former Peshmerga commander, was at the base, and he greeted the Peshmerga members warmly.


"Kirkuk is Kurdistan; that is the only point worth making. We have given thousands of lives for Kirkuk," Mohammed said.


Asked whether Kurdish troops would break ranks if fighting broke out between Kirkuk's sects, Mohammed said, "It's true that we are Iraqi army, but we are also Kurds. ... We will do whatever the Kurdish leadership tells us to."


A McClatchy reporter interviewing Kurdish troops in the Iraqi army during late 2005 heard similar remarks. The Iraqi defense ministry issued a press release at the time saying there was no substance to the issue of Peshmerga infiltration of army units in Kirkuk.




Senior Kurdish leaders have said in public that they'll pursue only peaceful means to wrest control of the city.


That same leadership has intentionally stocked Iraqi security forces with Peshmerga, said Fadil Haider, a senior member of the Kurdistan Islamic Union, a small but powerful political party, and a former member of the Iraqi national parliament.


The two main Kurdish parties - the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) - have done so as an insurance policy, he said.


"I can give you two scenarios: If Iraq is in an all-out civil war, then the PUK and KDP have put themselves in a position to protect Kurdistan by very quickly taking Kirkuk and making it a part of an independent Kurdistan," Haider said. "Or, if we exhaust the peaceful, political means of gaining Kirkuk for Kurdistan, we will take it by force."


Kurdish officials are confident that when Kirkuk becomes a part of the Kurdish regional government, its security will be maintained by Peshmerga, a process that presumably would be made easier by the fact that so many Iraqi police and army there are former members, said Suzanne Shahab Nouri, a member of the regional Kurdish parliament.


"The Kurdish Peshmerga forces are the strongest (Iraqi) military force in Iraq," said Jafar Mustafa Ali, the minister state for Peshmerga affairs - essentially a defense minister - in Sulaimaniyah. "If they (Kurdish opponents in Kirkuk) don't respect the democratic process, we could take over Kirkuk and they could do nothing."


---


On the Web: A member of McClatchy's Baghdad staff blogs about her trip to Baghdad's morgue to recover the body of her nephew in "Inside Iraq" at www.washingtonbureau.typepad.com/iraq/

A Turkish view of Kirkuk

A Turkish viewpoint on the Kirkuk issue. A vote is to be held this year on the status of the city. Kurds hope it will become part of the Kurdish area and are doing everything they can to influence the outcome.


Turkey's proactive initiative on Kirkuk
Friday, February 9, 2007




The seminars held in major US cities on Kirkuk are a manifestation of a new diplomacy effort by Ankara

ELIF ÖZMENEK
There has recently been a growing interest in the U.S. media over the issue of Kirkuk, with the Los Angeles Times naming the city as the next front in the war.

“American officials, regional leaders and residents are increasingly worried that this northern oil-rich city could develop into a third front in the country's civil war just as additional U.S. troops arrive in Baghdad and Al Anbar province as reinforcements for battles there,” read the LA Times of Feb. 1.

The Executive Director of the Institute of Turkish Studies David Cuthell elucidates: “Unfortunately the subject of Turkmens, like many of the subjects that have to do with Turkey or the Middle East, only seems to come up into the focus of the American public and government in times of crises. Now there is potential crisis in the case of Turkmens with respect to events taking place in Kirkuk.”

It is clear that Ankara is very concerned that the planned referendum this year would bring Kirkuk under Kurdish rule, since hundreds of thousands of Kurds have moved to the city in recent years. Turkey sees this population movement as a systematic campaign to change the demographic structure of the city to guarantee an outcome favoring the Kurds in the upcoming referendum.

“There are 10 billion barrels of oil underneath Kirkuk. That is almost 6 percent of the world's known oil reserves” said Cuthell, explaining the economic element that lies alongside the political one in Ankara's concern. Such an economic independence would boost prospects for the Kurds to establish an independent state next to Turkey's southeastern borders. Yet, on the other hand, the White House signals that it will not heed Turkey's demands for postponement of a planned referendum on the fate of the city to a later date.

Ankara, after a four-year roller coaster ride in Turkish-U.S. relations, now knows that the Bush government is not willing to risk their relationship with the Kurds to ease Turkey's concern over an independent Kurdistan. Thus there is a growing interest on the Turkish side to bring the issue of Kirkuk and the situation of Turkmens in the region to the U.S. public.



The Turkish outreach to US public opinion:

While Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül's visit to the United States continues, the Institute of Turkish Studies and the New York Turkmen Institute together organized a series of talks both in New York and Washington. Justice and Development Party (AKP) Balıkesir deputy Turhan Çömez and main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) Tokat deputy Orhan Ziya Diren attended these seminars as guess speakers.

Cuthell expressed his appreciation for their visit. “I have to applaud both parliamentarians Çömez and Diren for their effort to bring this issue to the American public.”

Çömez, in a private interview with the Turkish Daily News, stated that the aim of their visit is to change U.S. public opinion about Kirkuk and Turkmens. “I believe that Turkey should verbalize her main concerns at civil society platforms,” he said. “In this respect we will attend several conferences at universities and meet representatives of some nongovernmental organizations. We will explain Turkey's stance and expectations about Iraq and Kirkuk.”

Analysts say that the seminars on Kirkuk held in major U.S. cities are a manifestation of a new diplomacy effort to put a face to Turkey's regional claims that she can not stand by idly and watch a referendum disfranchise the Turkmen population.



Gül's proactive policy is successful:

“One of the things I find rather heartening is that under this current administration the Turkish diplomacy has become very proactive,” Cuthell says. The foreign minister has been to the U.S. on numerous occasions in the last year. I think this is reflective of basically a new foreign ministry and much more activist one. I believe that there is much better job [being done]… one being communicating concerns”

He also states that many U.S. politicians, academics and businessmen started to see that there is a new relationship developing between Turkey and United States that is no longer a younger brother-older brother one. “We are moving into an era of bilateral equality.”

Time will show if the United States will ever accept bilateral equality with Turkey. In the meantime though, the analysts say that Washington has found the AKP a party it can work with and that there is still no alternative at this point in Turkish politics.

*ozmenek@hotmail.com

A Kurdish viewpoint on Iraq

Obviously Kurdish autonomy or independence in Iraq is viewed with some fear by Turkey Syria and Iran and the referendum in Kirkuk may result in more ethnic violence.

The growing powers of Kurds in Iraq are becoming a threat to Turkey, the Sickman of Europe

2/8/2007 KurdishMedia.com - By Assad Waissi
According to press and media in the last two months, Turkish threat has become a main debate among KRG, Kurdish citizens, and Kurdish representatives in Baghdad. I would say the growing power of Kurds in Iraq and their influence on other parts of Kurdistan is not only threatening Turkey but Iran and Syria as well. The Turkish government and politicians are hopelessly becoming more and more desperate as the Kirkuk referendum gets closer. This fascist regime is taking every step to prevent the upcoming referenda in Kirkuk and to jeopardize peace and harmony in Kurdistan, Northern Iraq. They have held numbers of conferences with neighboring countries Iran, Syria, and other Arab nations, including members of Iraqi government as well as the Iraqi Turkmen front leader Sadettin Ergec and others to create violence and chaos between the Kurds, Arab, Turkmen, and other ethnicities. The goals of these conferences were specifically and overly aimed at the Kurds in Northern Iraq. They have achieved nothing except humiliation.

In spite of their desperation about the future of Kurds and their concern about the growing power of Kurds in Iraq, The Turks are left with anxiety about the future of the twenty-five million Kurds in their country. Their hopelessness has forced them to use threatening language to frighten Kurds in Iraq and other parts of Kurdistan. They have “repeatedly warned Iraqi Kurdish groups against trying to seize control of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, saying Turkey will not stand by amid growing tensions among ethnic Turkmens, Arabs and Kurds in Iraq's oil-rich north”(International Herald Tribune). I don’t think Turkish politicians and their support for the Turkmen would make any changes in the future of Kirkuk. The future of Kirkuk rests in the hands of the Iraqi government and Kurdish Regional Government, not with the Turkish politicians. Their interference was condemned by a large number of Kurdish representatives in Baghdad and also the KRG.

The rise of Kurdish power in Iraq is forcing the Turkish government and politicians to ally with Syria, Iran and other Arab nations to isolate Kurds. These countries have done all that was necessary in the past and today to contain the Kurds and keep control over those parts of Kurdistan that were granted to them and to assimilate and exterminate the Kurds.

They have denied Kurdish identity, deprived Kurds of their rights, and implement a policy of oppression against them. In this regard, they have in most cases cooperated and reached agreements among themselves to destroy Kurds by banning their language, media, and culture. They have brutally beaten down Kurdish uprisings by outlawing them and listing those Kurds as terrorists. The governments of Turkey, Iraq, and Iran are compelled to wage continual war against the Kurds. During this struggle, the Kurds have lost hundreds of thousands of their people and have been the victims of mass expulsions. You have all seen the result: Saddam Hussein and the massacres of Halabja and Anfal in Iraq. Tremendous suffering has been inflicted on us “Kurds,” This is, in fact, a case of genocide.

What they have done in the past and what they are trying to achieve today is to isolate the Kurds economically, socially, and culturally. They have plundered the riches of Kurdistan and prevented it from developing economically, socially, and culturally. This is exactly what Turkey hoping to achieve through his threatening language, and it is not taking them anywhere. However, they know they have lost the control and have no power to isolate the Kurds any longer. They know Kurdish questions are no longer about rights, freedom and equality. In other words, the Kurdish question is not the problem of a minority of the population of this or that country; it is the question of a divided country and a nation. The borders that divide Kurdistan are not natural, economic, or cultural borders. They are artificial borders drawn against the will of the Kurdish people according to the interests of the forces that did the dividing. In many cases, these borders have divided villages, towns, even families, and have had divisive and destructive effects on the economic, social, and cultural life of the Kurds in those regions.

They have fortunately failed in their dictatorial plans and tactics against Kurds because Kurdish national consciousness has strengthened from year to year, and we are stronger today than fifty or a hundred years ago.

Now is the time to strength our unity and nationhood. We the “Kurds” are the third largest nation in the Middle East and the largest nation in the world without our own state. Today Kurds worldwide are standing behind their proud and valuable historical movements and are working forward to end violence, racism, and oppression and to achieve social justice, peace, freedom, and equality for all Kurds. Yet we still continue to fail, despite our long history and rich culture, to attain our independence, even though we have waged resistance since the beginning of the nineteenth century and paid a high price for it. Our failure is because of the tribal social structure, divisions between religious movements, and party ideologies.

We the “Kurds” need to unite behind our brothers and sisters in Iraq, with Kurdish parties in Turkey, in Iran, and Syria and support their achievement and movement. Remember whenever it is questions about Kurdish rights and freedoms, these four nations have in most cases cooperated and reached agreements among themselves to isolate or destroy the Kurds. Yet even with this oppression, we sit silent and complain and blame other nations for not supporting our movements. It is our right and responsibility to support one another and decide on our own future. In order for us “Kurds” to be strong, we need to support one another be united. It does not matter if it is an uprising in Iraq, Turkey, Iran, and Syria. Our support through peaceful demonstration will strengthen their movement and provide a better future for you and me. These four states have always been in the state of fear whenever there is a single Kurdish demonstration or uprising in any Kurdish regions or any part of the world. These countries are no longer a threat to us “Kurds”; they know we are a threat to their colonization and dominance in Kurdish regions. For example, the growing power of Kurds in Iraq in term of economics, culture, solidarity, nationhood, and militarily has created tremendous fear in the hearts of Turkish politicians and government. Our future no longer rests with these fascist regimes; it rests within our solidarity.

Turkish government and politicians are now uniting with Iran, Syria, and other Arab nations to isolate the Kurds in Iraq from developing economically, socially, culturally, and nationally. We the Kurdish citizen of the four Kurdistan regions and particularly the Kurds in the Western Countries are sitting in silent and complain that U.S.A. and Britain betrayed the Kurds. Why wouldn’t they, when we do not support our own movements in Northern Iraq? We must support our people and their movements or will continue to fail like it has always failed in the past.

The most famous and important nationalist leader, Mohandas Gandhi, achieved the national independence of India using nonviolent methods such as organizing work stoppages and fasting until near death. We the Kurds are able to do that. We need to show our support through peaceful

demonstration to those who are fighting and dying for our freedom. For
example, Turkey is taking every step that is necessary to jeopardize Kurdish improvement in Iraq and also attacking the Kurdish parties “PKK” in Iraq. There has not yet been a single Kurdish uprising and demonstration either in any Kurdish regions or in the western countries where there are hundreds of thousands of Kurds residing. This is humiliation to our history and nationhood. This is a huge disappointment for the Kurdish organization and parties that are working hard and losing their lives for the sake of our rights and freedom.

Please, forget being a Kurd of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey; unite as one nation and support the KRG and other Kurdish movements that are effective in other parts of Kurdistan till death. This is the only way to prove our unity and nationhood. We must support the KRG and Kurdish “PKK” movement.

Strengthen them through our united voice and peaceful demonstrations.

Today is the most important time and opportunity to send our united voice and movements to those oppressive, imperial governments and other nations, including Britain, U.S. and the United Nation enough is enough. Our goals and future is in our hands, and the only way to achieve our goals is by uniting with our brother and sisters in Iraq, Turkey, Iran, and Syria through their movements. We can be united and can be strong.

Assad Waissi is a Kurdish writer lives in Canada.

Kirkuk another center of ethnic conflict

This area seems to be a powder keg. Conflict is increasing and there does not seem to be any accomodation of the Kurds with ethnic minorities but instead an attempt to drive out Arabs many of whom settled in Kirkuk during Saddam's reign.


Northern Iraq seen as next front in war
By By Louise Roug, Times Staff Writer

Kirkuk, Iraq — American officials, regional leaders and residents are increasingly worried that this northern oil-rich city could develop into a third front in the country’s civil war just as additional US troops arrive in Baghdad and Al Anbar province as reinforcements for battles there.

Al Qaeda-linked fighters recently have surfaced here, launching a wave of lethal attacks, US and Iraqi officials say. The attacks come amid a rise in communal tensions in the months before a referendum on the status of the city and the surrounding province.

Elsewhere in Iraq, Shiite and Sunni Arab Muslims are locked in a bitter civil war. Here, the two groups have a common cause against the Kurds, a non-Arab minority that dominates Iraq’s far-northern provinces.

The Kurds, Arabs and Turkmens, another minority group, each want control of this city and the region. At stake are land, water and some of Iraq’s richest oil reserves.

None of the groups want war, they say. Yet everyone here appears to be preparing for it.

“They are right when they call it a time bomb,” said Sheik Abdul Rahman Obeidi, a prominent Sunni Arab leader in Kirkuk. “We will not leave, and we will not let anyone take Kirkuk. We are ready to fight. We hope we won’t have to, but we’re ready.”

Kurdish leaders, in turn, warn that they will take the city by law or by force.

“People don’t have any more patience,” said Kurdish Councilman Rebwar Faiq Talabani, sitting in Kirkuk’s heavily fortified provincial council building. “They are telling the government, ‘If you can’t get our rights back, we’ll do it by ourselves’.“

Neighbouring countries, especially Turkey and Iran, fear that if the Kurds do gain control of Kirkuk, Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region would have the confidence and economic power to move toward independence. That could embolden Kurdish militants in the surrounding countries and further destabilise the region. Turkish officials recently have threatened to intervene if the Kurds take over Kirkuk and have warned against efforts to change the city’s population balance.

“Turkey cannot stand idly by, watching the efforts to change the demographic structure of Kirkuk,” Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said last month, according to the Cihan News Agency.

Turkish officials recently hosted a conference in Ankara, the Turkish capital, on the future of Kirkuk. Participants included Sunni Arab and Turkmen parties as well as the political party affiliated with radical Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr, all of whom oppose Kirkuk’s inclusion in Kurdistan. None of the main Kurdish parties were invited, and Kurdish lawmakers responded angrily, denouncing what they described as Turkish interference.

Against this backdrop of ethnic, political and regional tensions, Iraq’s new constitution mandates that a referendum on control of Kirkuk be held by the end of this year. If the vote goes ahead as scheduled, most analysts expect the Kurds to win.

Kurdish bureaucrats are pushing through little-noticed administrative decisions that will take away the voting rights of tens of thousands of Arabs.

Last year, at least 325 people were killed and 1,390 wounded in this city of about 1 million. During the first three weeks of this year, bombings and assassinations left 23 dead and 102 injured, police say. And on Sunday, police say, two car bombs killed 11 people and wounded 34.

“We expect increased violence when we get closer to” the referendum, said Maj. Gen. Anwar Mohammed Amin, the top Iraqi commander in Kirkuk.

The emergence of fighters from two radical Islamic groups with ties to Al Qaeda after years of lying low is especially troublesome, officials say. The groups, known as Ansar al Sunna and the Islamic Army in Iraq, have launched a bombing campaign targeting politicians and civilians. Their aim is to foment violence between ethnic and sectarian groups much as they have done in Baghdad and elsewhere, officials say.

Painting Iraq’s Sunni Arab guerrillas as Al Qaeda associates serves Kurds in their goal of taking control of Kirkuk and its environs by making the aims of their rivals seem less legitimate.

Assassinations, bombings and attacks on Kurdish parties’ headquarters by Shiite militias and Sunni groups linked to Al Qaeda “are now all part of Kirkuk’s violent landscape,” said a report last month from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Turkmen and Arab politicians also have been targeted in apparent retaliation by Kurds.

“Kirkuk is as likely as Baghdad to produce a calamity that can fracture Iraq,” the report’s authors wrote, recommending a delay of the referendum. The International Crisis Group, a nonprofit think tank based in Belgium, and the US government’s bipartisan Iraq Study Group also have recommended postponement.

But for Kurds, this year presents a historic opportunity they won’t part with willingly.

If Kirkuk were annexed to their region, Kurds would no longer be economically beholden to the rest of Iraq. Without Kirkuk, however, Kurdistan is not an economically viable state.

Once a distant dream carried in the heart of Kurdish peshmerga fighters as they battled Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s army in the mountains, full independence is now tantalizingly within reach.

If the timetable leading to the referendum is not followed, Kirkuk will be thrust into chaos, said Talabani, the provincial councilman. “It will be a civil war,” he said. “Worse than Baghdad, because it will be a battle of ethnicities.”

For nationalist Arabs and minority Turkmens, meanwhile, Kurdish appropriation of Kirkuk would signify the first step toward Iraq’s disintegration. Turkmens do not want to become part of an independent Kurdistan, but they don’t want to be controlled by Baghdad either. Most Arabs want to remain part of a unified Iraq.

As the various constituencies manoeuvre before the referendum, the issue of just who has the right to vote is emerging as a major point of contention.

In 1957, the year of Kirkuk’s last reliable census, Turkmens made up 40 per cent of the population, whereas Kurds composed 35 per cent, Arabs 24 per cent and Christians 1 per cent. In the surrounding province, Kurds were a majority, constituting 55 per cent of the inhabitants.

During the 1970s, however, Hussein forcibly removed 250,000 Kurds from Kirkuk, giving their property to Arabs in an effort to “Arabise” the city and its oil. Many of the new residents were Shiites moved here from villages in the south.

Since the US-led invasion in 2003, the demographics have shifted again. Thousands of Arabs and Turkmens have left because of political pressure and violence. And as many as 350,000 Kurds have come to Kirkuk, Iraqi and American officials say. In dilapidated camps throughout the city, thousands of Kurds now wait for property claims to be resolved; Kurdish officials complain that the government in Baghdad is slowing the process.

The Kurds want Arabs who moved here under Hussein to return to the south, and the recent administrative moves are aimed at removing them as potential voters in the referendum.

Kurdish officials have recently proposed a cash incentive for Arabs, compensation of about US$19,000 for each family willing to give up property and voting rights in the city. The tens of thousands of Arabs affected would be allowed to stay — though required to live in other accommodations — but would not be able to vote on Kirkuk’s future, the officials say.

“I don’t believe they have the right to vote in the referendum,” said Adnan Mufti, the powerful speaker of Kurdistan’s regional parliament. Even Arabs born in Kirkuk to parents who came from the south will be ineligible, he said. “It’s the mistake of their fathers.”

Arabs and Turkmens accuse Kurdish politicians of gerrymandering and administrative jujitsu. “Many of the Kurds who returned to Kirkuk are not the original residents of the city,” said Abass Ahmed, a 60-year-old Turkmen. “They are actually Kurds from other Kurdish regions.”

Because of the demographic shifts and the Sunni Arab boycott of the 2005 election, Arabs already have little representation in the city. Kurds control 26 of the 41 provincial council seats as well as the army, police and intelligence services in the city.

Iraqi security forces here mostly strike against Arab neighborhoods, said Amin, the Iraqi commander. But this is because Ansar al Sunna and the Islamic Army in Iraq are primarily Arab groups, he added.

But residents and international observers accuse the Kurds of abusing Arabs and Turkmens and holding them in secret and largely unsupervised prison facilities.

“We are being insulted especially in the Arab villages and the Arab neighborhoods,” said Obeidi, the Sunni Arab sheik. “I think, for the Kurdish forces, it’s like revenge.”

These alleged human rights violations inflame the situation, analysts warn and local politicians confirm.

“We are all arming ourselves,” a politician from Kirkuk recently told the International Crisis Group. “We are afraid. There is talk of civil war. Anything could start it.”

roug@latimes.com