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Iraq’s Kirkuk needs political solution: UN
21.4.2008
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April
21, 2008
BAGHDAD, -- The status of the northern Iraqi
Kurdish city of Kirkuk must be solved through a
political formula and not a hastily organized
referendum that could trigger violence, the U.N.
special representative to Iraq said.
Staffan de Mistura said a peaceful settlement of
multi-ethnic Kirkuk's fate -- which he called the
"mother of all issues" in Iraq -- would be vital to
long-term stability.
Iraq's minority Kurds, who control the northern
Kurdistan region, see Kirkuk as their ancient
capital. Arabs encouraged to move there under Saddam
Hussein want it to stay under Baghdad.
A referendum had been due by the end of 2007 to
decide Kirkuk's status but was delayed for six
months,www.ekurd.net
partly to give the
United Nations time to come up with proposals for
settling the issue. Analysts say a vote on Kirkuk,
which sits on one of the world's largest oil fields,
could spark a bloodbath.
"Kirkuk needs to be solved through a political
formula in which everybody, majorities and
minorities, feel comfortable," De Mistura told
Reuters in an interview late last week.
"Otherwise, no referendum will be able to solve it
and there will only be ongoing conflict and the last
thing Iraq needs is a conflict about Kirkuk."
After talks in Brussels last week with NATO and EU
officials, De Mistura said the United Nations would
suggest a formula by May 15 to resolve conflicts on
several disputed areas in Iraq that could serve as a
template for Kirkuk.
He said he would propose options so Iraq could
decide under which authority to put four disputed
locations, which he did not identify. These
locations would not include Kirkuk.
Speaking to Reuters in Baghdad, De Mistura said
these locations could be greater than four and were
near Kirkuk.
He said suggestions for determining administrative
responsibility for these disputed areas would
hopefully serve as an example for Kirkuk, 250 km
(155 miles) north of Baghdad.
As part of any solution, minorities would have to be
protected, he said. And a referendum was not the
answer until there was a political solution, he
added.
The disputed areas have mixed Kurdish and Arab
populations.
"Nobody doubts that Kirkuk is a crucial area for
Iraq and for the region. It's become also a symbol
of what could be national reconciliation or possibly
major conflict, even with regional involvement," he
said.
Neighboring Turkey fears Iraq's Kurds will wrest
control of Kirkuk and turn it into the capital of a
new state, possibly reigniting separatism among its
own sizable Kurdish population.
De Mistura declined to answer a question on whether
the ethnic makeup of Kirkuk was changing, but said
the United Nations was trying to get an accurate
picture of the population.
The Iraqi government has offered Arab families
compensation to return to their original towns. But
Arabs and Turkmen accuse Kurds of trying to drive
them out of the city.
Kirkuk city is historically 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, 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.".
The article 140 in Iraqi constitution calls for conducting a census to be
followed by a referendum to let the inhabitants
decide whether they would like Kirkuk to be annexed
to the autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan region or having
it as an independent province.
These stages were supposed to end on December 31,
2007, a deadline that was later extended to six
months.
The former regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein
had 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.
Kurds seek to include the city in the autonomous
Iraq's Kurdistan region, while Sunni Muslims,
Turkmen and Shiites oppose the incorporation. The
article currently stipulates that all Arabs in
Kirkuk be returned to their original locations in
southern and central Iraqi areas, and formerly
displaced residents returned to Kirkuk.
Copyright, respective author or news agency,
Reuters, Agencies
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