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Kurdistan spokesman: Turkish fiery 'Erdogan'
statements rejected over Kirkuk 13.1.2007
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Erbil, Kurdistan
Region (Iraq), January 12, -– Iraq's Kurdistan
presidency spokesman rejected on Friday statements
recently made by Turkish officials on Kirkuk calling
such statements "meaningless."
"We for a while have heard of meaningless statements
by some Turkish officials that implied threats and
we want to remind them of that the Ottoman empire
had fallen a long time ago and Iraq is not part of
Turkey," the spokesman said.
The Kurdish statements came in reply to what the
Kurds saw as threats made by the Turkish Prime
Minster Recep Tayyip Erdogan when he indicated last
week that Turkey will no sit idle if the Iraqi Kurds
controlled over the oil rich city of Kirkuk.
Erdogan said in a Turkish parliament session that
efforts are under way to change the demography of
Kirkuk population and Turkey will not tolerate such
attempts. |
Kirkuk city |
These endeavors, the Turkish Premier remarked, may
lead to a situation harmer than civil war in Iraq
and may affect the region as a whole.
The Kurdish oil-rich-Kirkuk, 250 km northeast of
Baghdad, lies just south border of the Kurdistan
autonomous region, is a mixed city of Majority
Kurds, minorities are Arabs and Turkmans.
Iraq's Kurdistan statement urged Turkey to assist
Iraq and not to interfere in its internal affairs.
VOI
The former Iraqi president forced about 250,000
Kurdish residents to give up their homes to Arabs in
the 1970s, to "Arabize" the city and the region's
oil industry.
Kirkuk city lies just south border of the Kurdistan
autonomous region and it is not under the full
control of Kurdistan Regional Government
administration.
A referendum is to be held in late 2007 to decide
whether the oil-rich Kurdish province should be
annexed to the safe semiautonomous Kurdistan region
in Iraq's north.
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