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Jalal Talabani says no regional conflicts
over Kirkuk
3.2.2008
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February 3, 2008
Kirkuk, Iraq's border with Kurdistan region,
-- Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said Kirkuk
would not witness regional conflicts for it is an
Iraqi city subject to the country's constitution,
noting article 140 on the situation in Kirkuk was
legal and would be implemented.
"A period of six months was set to implement article
140 of the Iraqi constitution pertaining to Kirkuk.
Implementation of this article would take place on
its due time," Talabani said during a press
conference held on Saturday evening at his residence
in Kirkuk.
Talabani had arrived on Wednesday in the oil-rich
Kurdish city that was the theme of recent political
haggle due to the application of article 140 of the
Iraqi constitution, which has to do with disputed
regions. The article provides for normalization and
census as a prelude for a self-determination
referendum. |
Iraqi President : Jalal Talabani, a Kurd |
The referendum was supposed to take place late last
year but the ad hoc committee called for extending
the deadline to end the stages of its work. Also,
the UN had appealed to the Kurdish leaders to delay
implementation of the article for six months.
On his visit to the city, the Iraqi president said
he met with all groups in Kirkuk. "There are
opinions by all groups favoring fraternity and
peaceful coexistence," Talabani said, stressing the
need to increase appropriations for Kirkuk from the
state budget.
Talabani expressed support for the quota system in
Kirkuk as a solution to distribute administrative
posts in accordance with the consensus of the four
ethnic groups in the city: the Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen
and Assyrians.
"The problem of distributing administrative posts
would be solved on the basis of 32% for the Arabs,
32% for the Kurds, 32% for the Turkmen and 4% for
the Christian Assyrians," he said,www.ekurd.net
noting "Christians in
Iraq are Iraqi citizens and have their rights."
Speaking on the Iraqi-Turkish relations, he replied
that they were "historic".
"We hope those ties would grow even stronger at the
political, economic and cultural levels," he said,
expressing readiness to visit Turkey if he received
an official invitation.
Kirkuk city is a Kurdish city
and it lies just south border of the Kurdistan
autonomous region, the population is a mix of
majority Kurds and minority of Arabs,www.ekurd.net
Christians and
Turkmen. lies 250 km northeast of Baghdad. Kurds
have a strong cultural and emotional attachment to Kirkuk, which they call "the Kurdish Jerusalem.", Kirkuk is historically a Kurdish city.
The former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein forced
over 250,000 Kurdish residents to give up their
homes to Arabs in the 1970s, to "Arabize" the city
and the region's oil industry.
Under article 140 of Iraq’s constitution a
referendum must be held on whether the city secedes
to control of the Kurdistan region al government KRG.
A referendum, provided for in the Iraqi
constitution, was scheduled to be held by the end of
the past year on including the city into the
Kurdistan region, but the UN mediated to
extend its time to July 2008.
VOI | Agencies
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