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ISTANBUL- In the northern Iraqi city of
Kirkuk, where Turkish and Kurdish interests collide,
provincial elections that are part of Sunday's
polling could trigger an ethnic war and wider
regional instability, an international
conflict-resolution group has warned.
In a report scheduled for release on Wednesday, the
International Crisis Group, an independent
organization that tries to prevent and resolve
global conflicts, described Kirkuk as a powder keg
set to explode if Kurds sweep the election for a new
regional council, creating a situation that might
tempt Turkey to intervene to protect the city's
ethnic Turkmen population.
"It is not at all a good idea to have provincial
elections in Kirkuk at this time," said Joost R.
Hiltermann, the Middle East project director of the
Crisis Group and author of the Kirkuk report.
"Various groups are arming themselves and it may
take only a minor provocation for open conflict to
break out."
Turkey has issued similar warnings about the fragile
political balance in Kirkuk between Kurds, Turkmen
and Arabs, accusing the main Kurdish political
parties of packing the voter rolls in recent weeks
with Kurds taken to the city from other parts of
Iraq and from outside the country.
"We see this issue as a matter that will endanger
the future of Iraq as a whole," said a senior
government official in Ankara.
Kirkuk's rich oil deposits make it a prize sought by
Iraqi Kurds and the interim government in Baghdad,
but the city has remained relatively violence-free
compared with much of the rest of Iraq since Saddam
Hussein was toppled. The calm is attributed to the
success of a temporary power-sharing arrangement
that was brokered by American occupation forces last
year, giving an equal number of Kirkuk council seats
to Kurds, Turkmen and Arabs.
While Turkey supports the Iraqi elections in
general, the official said, the Kirkuk region should
be considered a case apart, at least until Iraq has
a constitution and Kirkuk residents have the right
to decide the city's ultimate status.
http://www.nytimes.com
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