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Kurdistan Peshmerga troops fire on Iraqi
army helicopter in dispute areas
19.12.2012 |
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December 19, 2012
KIRKUK, Iraq's border with Kurdistan region,—
Troops from Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan opened fire
on an Iraqi army helicopter on Tuesday, underscoring
tensions between Baghdad's Arab-led central
government and the Kurdish region, officials said.
Iraq's government and self-ruled Kurdistan last
month both sent troops from their respective armies
to reinforce positions around towns in (Kurdish
areas outside Kurdistan region) disputed areas where
they both claim control as part of a broader feud
over oil and territory.
Kurdistan Peshmerga officials said on Tuesday they
fired on an Iraqi military helicopter near the
Kurdish town of Sikanyan just north of the
ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk, to keep the
aircraft from taking surveillance pictures of their
military positions.
"We opened fire at an Iraqi military helicopter
flying over our forces," said Anwar Othman, deputy
minister for Kurdish military affairs. "This is a
clear message that next time our response will be
tougher."
A local mayor in the area confirmed the incident.
But there was no immediate response from the Iraqi
central government.
The growing rift between Baghdad and Kurdistan is
the most challenging test to Iraq's federal unity
since the last American troops left a year ago,
removing a buffer of U.S. military presence from an
area long seen as a flashpoint for conflict.
News of the clash came just hours after authorities
announced Iraq's President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd,
had been hospitalized following a stroke that had
left him in critical but stable condition.
A veteran Kurdish politician, Talabani has been a
key mediator between Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's
central government and the Kurdistan Regional
Government who are growing further apart over how to
control oil wealth and the disputed territories
between their two regions.
Iraqi armed forces and Kurdish Peshmerga have faced
off before only to back off before any major
confrontation and U.S. officials have been in talks
with both regions to try to ease tensions between
them.
The ethnically mixed, disputed areas are a swathe of
land separating Iraq from the territory administered
by ethnic Kurds in the north,www.ekurd.net
and they include the sensitive city of Kirkuk, which
sits atop some of the world's largest oil reserves.
Bombings and attacks across those areas killed more
than 30 people on Sunday and Monday in what
authorities said was an attempt by insurgents to
stoke Arab-Kurdish tensions.
Violence in Iraq has eased since the height of
sectarian attacks in 2006-2007. But Sunni Islamists
still carry out bombings nearly a decade after the
American-led invasion to oust Saddam Hussein.
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.net 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.
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.
Copyright ©, respective author or news agency,
Reuters | Ekurd.net | Agencies
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