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Turkish offensive on Iraqi Kurdistan would
lead to humanitarian crisis, ICRC warns
18.10.2007 |
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October
18, 2007
DUHOK, Kurdistan region 'Iraq', -- A
humanitarian crisis will accompany any large-scale
Turkish military operations aimed at pursuing
Turkish-Kurdish PKK rebels in Kurdistan region
'northern Iraq', the International Committee of the
Red Cross (ICRC) warned on 17 October.
"Any military conflict in the region will bring
about a humanitarian crisis as civilians will be
killed or displaced due to shelling and troop
incursions," said northern Iraq ICRC spokesperson
Flamerz Mohammed.
"So far the Turkish artillery shells… over the past
few days only concentrated on abandoned mountains
and did not reach Kurdish border villages, but we
are observing and assessing the situation on the
borders," Mohammed said.
"All our warehouses in the region are filled with
food, medicines and aid materials for emergencies
and if the situation deteriorates then we will rely
on our warehouses in neighbouring countries," he
said.
On 17 October the Turkish parliament overwhelmingly
approved a possible cross-border offensive against
Kurdish PKK rebels of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)
allegedly operating in northern Iraq’s autonomous
Kurdistan region.
Hours before the vote, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri
al-Maliki called his Turkish counterpart to say that
his government was determined to halt the "terrorist
activities" of the PKK on Iraqi territory, his
office said.
Kurdish rebels from the PKK, have been fighting
since 1984 for the autonomy of Turkey's
Kurdish-dominated southeast.
According to the Turkish government, the conflict,
which reached a peak in the mid-1990s, has claimed
tens of thousands of lives; thousands of Kurdish
villages have been affected and hundreds of
thousands of Kurds have fled to cities in other
parts of Turkey.
Villagers fearful
The ICRC said that although there had so far been no
major displacements among Kurdish villagers along
the border, families were worried.
"The villagers are worried and are in a panic as
they have no idea what will happen in the coming
days," the ICRC’s
Mohammed said.
About two months ago, shepherd Mustafa Haji Ahmed
lost six of his cattle in mountain pastures near the
border when artillery shells landed nearby: "Since
then I haven’t been up to the mountains and our
cattle are deprived of these rich pastures, and that
has affected our life a lot," said Ahmed, a
51-year-old father-of-five.
At the time, Ahmed was among about 200 people in
Nazdori village, about 25km from the Turkish border,
who were forced out of their houses to safer areas
by the shelling.
"Now, too, we are under threat, but this time things
could be tougher as winter is coming,” he added.
What makes another villager, Tahseen Barwari, more
worried is that military operations could prevent
her children from attending school: "I'm afraid my
children will not be able to continue their classes
as about 20 artillery shells hit our village last
time and [we] were forced to leave everything
behind," Tahseen, a 47-year-old mother-of-seven,
said.
Fears of violence rekindled
The Turkish threats have rekindled fears of violence
among those Iraqi Arab families who had fled other
violence-affected parts of Iraq to seek shelter in
the Kurdistan region.
One of these is Khalid Nisaif al-Jibouri, a
39-year-old father-of-three who fled his house in
Baghdad months ago to stay in a two-room apartment
in Kurdistan.
"Relentless violence in Baghdad forced us to leave
for this peaceful area, but the news we are getting
these days makes us fearful again of something we
had almost forgotten - insecurity," said al-Jibouri
who lives in Duhok in the extreme north of Iraq.
On 16 October the head of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR)
expressed deep concern at the prospect of any
Turkish military incursion, warning it could
exacerbate the refugee situation.
"It [northern Iraq] is an area also where you will
find Iraqis from the south and from central Iraq
that went there to seek security, and of course we
strongly hope that this relative security in
Kurdistan will not be affected," Antonio Guterres,
the UN high commissioner for refugees, said.
irinnews org
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