U.S. President George W. Bush (R) and
President of Kurdistan
Regional Government (Iraq) Massoud Barzani (L)
Photo: AP |
In recent weeks Iraq has
passed three important milestones. The
constitutional referendum on Oct. 15 was a powerful
demonstration of Iraqis' desire to establish
democracy and save a country still recovering from
its disastrous history. Two days later the remains
of 500 of my kinsmen were returned from a mass grave
in southern Iraq for reburial in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Another 7,500 of my kin are still missing after
"disappearing" from a Baathist concentration camp in
1983 in the first phase of the genocidal Anfal
campaign, which caused the death of 182,000 Kurdish
civilians during the 1980s. Then, on Oct. 19, Saddam
Hussein finally went on trial.
None of this would have been possible without the
U.S.-led liberation of Iraq, an operation in which
Kurds were proud partners. After the U.S. armed
forces, our peshmerga was the second-largest member
of the coalition. |
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Today the security forces of Iraqi Kurdistan remain
highly capable and reliable allies of the United
States. By consistently working with the United
States and reaching out to our fellow Iraqis, we
have been at the heart of a political process based
on equality and inclusion, on consensus and
compromise.
Above all, we have taken the path of engagement
because, like the United States, we need Iraq to
succeed and avoid a repetition of the horrors of the
past. We have therefore been engaged in Iraqi
national politics and governance. Kurds have joined
the new Iraqi military in large numbers. We have
made unprecedented sacrifices. Time and again we
have pursued political settlements by encouraging
flexibility and consensus.
And yet the Kurds have been vilified as separatists
and derided for "overreaching." This stems from a
belief that our aim is independence, and from the
chauvinism that defines the Middle East as
homogenous, that refuses to accepts its inherent
diversity. What those who carp at the victims in
Iraq fail to understand is that Kurds, like other
Iraqis, crave security -- security for the future
and security from the terrors of the past. We
suffered more than 80 years of discrimination and
disadvantage -- suffering that culminated in
anti-Kurdish ethnic cleansing and genocide.
Unlike our critics, Kurds are pragmatists and
moderates. We know that we have rights, but we also
understand that we have responsibilities. We are
patriots, not suicidal nationalists. That moderation
has translated into a commitment to dialogue. We
were pivotal in the establishment of the Iraqi
Governing Council in July 2003 without any
preconditions. We were under no obligation to
reattach Kurdistan to Iraq. After all, the United
States is not asking Kosovo to rejoin Serbia.
Our desire for security and our principles of
moderation and dialogue were key factors in the
proposal of all the major Iraqi political parties to
create a federal, pluralistic and democratic Iraq in
which power is decentralized and so less open to
abuse. Iraqis of all communities recognize that only
such a formula can keep Iraq intact.
In Iraqi Kurdistan we have, for the past 14 years,
accepted the idea that we are a diverse society.
Ethnic and religious minorities -- Assyrian and
Chaldean Christians, Yazidis and Turkomans -- all
serve in the Kurdistan regional government and all
have the right to educate their children in their
mother tongues and to broadcast in their own
languages. We firmly believe that the Middle East
must accommodate all of its peoples and all of their
languages and religions. Nor is Kurdistan alone in
this regard. In the new Iraq, the Kurds see their
role as bridge builders, as a community that has
every interest in an inclusive political process
that gives Iraq a better future while addressing the
injustices of the past.
Just as Kurds have not taken revenge on the Arab
settlers who took over their land, so the moderate
Sunni Arabs and Shiite Arabs of Iraq have shown
similar forbearance in the face of a wave of suicide
bombings that has claimed many thousands of lives.
All democratic Iraqis have shown they realize that
the wrongs of the past can be redressed only through
agreed-on legal mechanisms and that justice cannot
be selective. It is as important for Kurds to be
allowed to return to Kirkuk and for Marsh Arabs to
be restored to their homes as it is for Saddam
Hussein to be put on trial.
The restraint of the victims, the defiance of the
millions who vote -- refusing to be drawn into the
civil war fantasies of the terrorists -- vindicate
the courage and vision of the United States and its
coalition partners. Backing this fundamentally sound
vision has been President Bush's moral understanding
of the healing and dignity that democracy confers
upon all men and women, an understanding that the
Kurds share.
The United States has never wavered in its quest to
help Iraqis build a democracy that rewards
compromise and consensus. The ever-generous American
people have paid a tragic price, the lives of their
finest men and women, to advance the banner of
freedom and democracy, a sacrifice for which we are
profoundly grateful. We all know that democracy is
the only solution to political problems, the only
method by which grievances can be addressed. In this
war and for these principles, the Kurds are true
friends of the United States.
The writer is president of the Kurdistan region
of Iraq.
www.krg.org
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