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Kurds refuse any constitutional amendments
impinging on pluralism in Iraq
29.5.2007 |
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May
29, 2007
Kirkuk, Kurdistan region border with (Iraq),
-- The Kurds do not agree to any amendments to the
Iraqi constitution that will impinge on pluralism,
the deputy speaker of the Iraqi Kurdistan region's
parliament said on Monday.
Kamal Kirkuki said committees were set up in Baghdad
to follow up on important issues pertaining to the
region, including the law on oil and article 140 of
the Iraqi Constitution.
"The recommendations and decisions of these ad hoc
committees will be considered by the Iraqi Kurdistan
region's presidency," Kirkuki said.
He stressed, "there are no decisions or draft laws
passed without the Iraqi Kurdistan region's
approval."
The draft law on oil and gas is one the most
controversial issues in Iraq.
Seen as a compromise between Sunnis, Shiites and
Kurds, the law calls for the distribution of oil
revenue to the governorates or regions based on
population numbers, and grants regional governments
or oil companies the right to draw up contracts with
foreign companies for the exploration and
development of new oil fields.
Regions will be allowed to enter into
production-sharing agreements with foreign firms and
a federal Oil And Gas Council will be established to
oversee these agreements, holding veto power over
the regional governments.
"These committees were set up after a visit by Iraqi
Kurdistan region's Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani
to the Iraqi capital Baghdad and his meeting with
members of the Kurdistan Coalition, the second
largest bloc in the Iraqi parliament," which has 55
seats out of the Iraqi parliament's 275, said
Kirkuki.
He said there were "initial guarantees from Baghdad
to activate article 140 of the constitution by the
end of 2007 to bring home the Kurds deported from
Kirkuk during the former regime's time and to hold a
referendum on the disputed areas."
Article 140 of Iraq's constitution regulates the
mechanisms to normalize the situation in the
northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk.
Kurds claim that the demographic distribution of
Kirkuk's population was considerably changed after
the 1980s, following attempts by the former regime
to encourage Iraqi Arabs to flock into the city in a
bid to change the demographic composition of the
city's population.
Oil-rich Kirkuk now has a mixed population of
majority Kurds and minority of Arabs, Turkmen.
VOI
**
Kirkuk city is a Kurdistani city and it lies just
south border of the Kurdistan autonomous region and
it is not under the full control of Kurdistan
Regional Government administration, its population
is a mix of majority Kurds and minority of Arabs,
Turkmen.
The former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein 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.
Based on Iraq's Constitution 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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