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Kurdistan, the last anchor of stability
2.6.2007 |
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June
2, 2007
A Turkish invasion at the northern border would
compound Iraq's tragedy - Kurdistan is the only area
where relative security prevails.
"As soldiers, we are ready," Turkey's chief of staff
General Buyukanit said yesterday, as he sent more
tanks to Iraq's northern border. He meant it to
provoke Turkey's parliament to approve military
action against Turkish separatist rebels of the PKK
(Kurdistan Workers' party) hiding in Iraq and to
give a bloody nose to Iraqi Kurdistan, whose growing
autonomy Turkish nationalists watch with anger.
But it also presented a fundamental challenge to the
US and the multinational force in Iraq, whose
mandate entrusts it with "the maintenance of
security and stability", including "protecting the
territory of Iraq".
Reeling from recent bombings in Ankara and Marmaris,
blamed on separatists, Turkey has legitimate
security concerns. It has also expressed solidarity
with the Turkmen community within Iraq, who like
other Iraqi minorities have suffered killings and
death threats in the current conflict. But Turkey's
very public military manoeuvres yesterday had little
to do with protecting Turkey or the Iraqi Turkmen
and everything to do with mustering nationalist
support in the upcoming Turkish elections.
For one thing, sending the tanks over the border
into Kurdistan-Iraq is unlikely to score quick gains
against Kurdish militias based in the mountains,
particularly if the Iraqi peshmerga become engaged
in defending their territory. It may even be counted
a success by the PKK diehards. Renewed state
repression of Turkey's Kurds would certainly enable
them to rebuild popular support for armed resistance
and would also endanger Turkey's bid for EU
accession.
Most immediately, an invasion would compound Iraq's
tragedy. The chief of staff's latest bout of
sabre-rattling may have been a calculated reaction
to the announcement this week that the multinational
force in Iraq was handing over formal control of the
three northern Iraqi governorates to the Kurdistan
regional government. But in practice, the Kurdish
security forces have long been in control, not just
since 2003 but before, when Kurdish peshmerga
(Kurdistan national gurad) supplied the ground
deterrent to Saddam Hussein's forces under the
protection of a "no-fly zone" imposed by US and
allied forces.
Although there have been attacks, such as two major
bombings in Erbil last month, Kurdistan is the only
area of Iraq where relative security prevails.
Within the KRG borders the level of sectarian
tension is comparatively low and the men at the
ubiquitous checkpoints are disciplined and thorough.
There is one other difference. You don't see any
American or British troops. The Americans are here
of course, in the lobby of the Sheraton Hotel in
Erbil or at the prison fortress of Suse on the
Dukan-Sulaimaniyah road, whose vast battlements
incarcerate an ever-growing number of detainees from
across Iraq. But when I asked a Kurdish minister
about the absence of multinational forces on patrol,
he explained that the only international troops on
regular duty in Kurdistan were a unit of South
Koreans. "The Koreans are here to guard the UN - and
the peshmerga guard the Koreans." I smiled at the
joke and at his national pride. But the next day I
paid my first visit to the UN compound and found it
inside four concentric rings of security. On the
inside was a unit of Fijian police, then a series of
two checkpoints manned by nervous Korean soldiers
and on the perimeter, guarding the whole, three
smiling Kurds.
In fact, security in Kurdistan, arguably the most
ethnically and religiously diverse of all Iraq's
regions, relies less on the prowess of the peshmerga
than on an effective, albeit imperfect,
accommodation between different groups - Kurds,
Turkmen and Assyrians, as well as Arabs. The
different communities are present in the Kurdistan
national assembly, sometimes representing their own
political parties and sometimes on the ticket of one
of the Kurdish parties, and their cultural centres
are visible in the major towns.
This is not to say that there are not serious human
rights concerns. In April in Sulaimaniyah city I saw
a group of Iraqi journalists, lawyers and government
employees grill the Kurdish human rights minister,
and they gave him a hard time on everything from
corruption to secret prisons. The Turkmen and other
minorities in Iraq in particular need strong and
committed advocates. But the threat of a Turkish
invasion will only provoke Kurdish paranoia about
Turkmen nationalism.
The US has repeatedly condemned Iranian and Syrian
interference in Iraq but its response to the rising
threats of Turkish invasion has been remarkably low
key. This in itself is probably not such a bad
thing, given the overheated rhetoric engaged in both
by Turkish leaders and by the KRG's President
Barzani. But the language of diplomacy should not
obscure the starkness of the choice now facing the
US and the multinational force: either rein in the
Turkish military or risk losing the one anchor of
stability left in Iraq.
commentisfree- guardianco.uk
** The use of the term "Kurdistan" is vigorously
rejected due to its alleged political implications
by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize
the existence of a "Turkish Kurdistan" Southeast
Turkey.
Others estimate over 40 million Kurds live in
Big Kurdistan (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Armenia),
which covers an area as big as France, about half of
all Kurds which estimate to 20 million live in
Turkey.
Kurds are not recognized as an official minority in
Turkey and are denied rights granted to other
minority groups. Under EU pressure, Turkey recently
granted Kurds limited rights for broadcasts and
education in the Kurdish language, but critics say
the measures do not go far enough.
Turkey is home to over 25 million ethnic Kurds, some
of whom openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey.
Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed
severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish language,
prohibiting the language in education and broadcast
media.
The Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized
in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q
which do not exist in the Turkish
alphabet has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and
2003
The Kurdish flag flown officially in Iraqi Kurdistan
but unofficially flown by Kurds in Armenia. The flag
is banned in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where flying it
is a criminal offence"
Southeastern Turkey:
North Kurdistan ( Kurdistan-Turkey)
wikipedia
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