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Kirkuk: Iraqi Muslims, Christians pray for calm in north |
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Kirkuk: Iraqi Muslims, Christians pray for
calm in north
2.6.2011 |
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June
2, 2011
KIRKUK, Iraq's border with Kurdistan region,
— Iraqi Muslim leaders have joined their Christian
counterparts for prayers at a church in Kirkuk, in a
public bid to ease tensions in the disputed northern
city. In disputed Kirkuk city: Iraqi Muslims,
Christians pray for calm in north.
Around 1,500 people -- including Arabs, Kurds and
Turkmen -- gathered at the Chaldean Cathedral late
on Tuesday, singing Christian hymns before reciting
prayers and verses from the Bible and the Koran.
"Christians and Muslims have gathered together here
in Kirkuk, which has suffered from deadly violence
that has scared us all in recent weeks," said Louis
Sakho, Chaldean archbishop of Kirkuk, scene of
deadly unrest last month.
"It is appropriate for Christians and Muslims to
pray together for peace and stability in our country
and our city, which has been shocked by recent
events."
Sakho added he hoped to hold similar prayers in
Sunni and Shiite mosques in future, "to have a firm
and true fraternal stand for peace, stability and
security in our city."
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The Kurds are seeking to integrate the province into the semi-autonomous
Kurdistan Region clamming it to be historically a Kurdish city, 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." Kurds see it as the rightful and
perfect capital of an autonomous Kurdistan state.
Photo: Yahya Ahmed/AP |
Adnan Sayid Fattah Agha, the head of the Kurdish
Kakiyah tribe, noted the event "brought us back to
the original reality -- Muslims, Christians, Arabs,
Kurds, Turkmen together."
"Their lives and their destiny are one, living
together."
Kirkuk lies at the centre of a swathe of territory
claimed by the central government and Kurdish
regional authorities.
Kurdish leaders want to incorporate the province in
their northern autonomous region despite opposition
from its Arab and Turkmen communities, in a row US
officials have long said is one of the biggest
threats to Iraq's stability.
A spate of bomb attacks against police in Kirkuk
city killed at least 29 people on May 19, in the
deadliest violence to hit Iraq in nearly two months.
Currently, US forces participate in
confidence-building tripartite patrols and
checkpoints with central government forces and
Kurdish security officers in Kirkuk and across
northern Iraq.
But the withdrawal of some 45,000 US troops still in
Iraq must be completed by the end of the year,
according to the terms of a bilateral security pact.
The oil-rich province of Kirkuk is one of the most disputed areas by the
regional government and the Iraqi government in Baghdad.
The Kurds are seeking to integrate the province into the semi-autonomous
Kurdistan Region clamming it to be historically a Kurdish city, it lies just
south border of the Kurdistan autonomous region,www.ekurd.netthe 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." Kurds see it as the rightful and
perfect capital of an autonomous Kurdistan state.
Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution is related to
the normalization of the situation in Kirkuk city
and other disputed areas through having back its
Kurdish inhabitants and repatriating the Arabs
relocated in the city during the former regime’s
time to their original provinces in central and
southern Iraq.
The article also 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.
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.
The last ethnic-breakdown census in Iraq was
conducted in 1957, well before Saddam began his
program to move Arabs to Kirkuk. That count showed
178,000 Kurds, 48,000 Turkomen, 43,000 Arabs and
10,000 Assyrian-Chaldean Christians living in the
city.
In an effort to promote cooperation between Arab and
Kurdish security forces along the disputed territory
of which Kirkuk is at the centre, the US military
began conducting tripartite patrols and running
joint checkpoints with the two sides at the start of
2010.
Those efforts will conclude when US forces withdraw
from the country by the end of this year, according
to a bilateral security pact with Iraq.
Copyright ©, respective
author or news agency,
AFP | ekurd.net | Agencies
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