|
The Limits of Turkey's Kurdish Efforts in
Iraq
19.7.2012
By Denise Natali
—
Al Monitor |
|
|
|
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan (R) and
Kurdistan Regional President Massoud Barzani pose
for the media before their meeting in Istanbul April
19, 2012. Photo: Reuters.
Denise Natali is the Minerva Fellow at the Institute
for National Strategic Studies INSS, National Defense
University and the author of The Kurdish
Quasi-State: Development and Dependency in Post Gulf
War Iraq.
•
Read more by the Author
July
19, 2012
One place where Turkey’s ‘zero-problems with
neighbors’ policy seems to be working is in the
Kurdistan Region of Iraq. In just five years, Ankara
has used its soft power to turn a once conflicted
relationship with the Kurdistan Regional Government
(KRG) into an economically and politically
profitable one. Still, even this alliance has its
limits. Ankara may be highly engaged in the Kurdish
oil market, but it will not fully support the
Kurdistan Regional Government KRG’s quest for
economic independence. Nor is Turkey willing to
completely alienate Baghdad for its Iraqi Kurdish
ally. Despite tensions between Turkish Prime
Minister Recip Tayyip Erdogan and Iraqi Prime
Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Ankara remains vested in
the Iraqi oil sector and committed to Iraq's
territorial unity. These ongoing ties, as well as
political trends in Iraq, will further challenge the
KRG’s energy ambitions and create greater pressure
for an Erbil-Baghdad energy compromise.
Thus far, the Turkish-KRG alliance has been a
mutually beneficial one. By partnering with Iraqi
Kurdish president Massoud Barzani, Ankara has been
able to address a number of economic and foreign
policy concerns simultaneously; checking the
Kurdistan Workers' Party's (PKK) militancy in border
areas, mediating Syrian Kurdish nationalists,
forming a stronger defense against Iranian
influence; and becoming a regional energy hub. In
return, the KRG has used Turkish investments to
develop an alternative energy market that has helped
expand its autonomy and challenge central government
authority. With Ankara’s support, the KRG has
circumvented Baghdad’s payment and export
restrictions by reviving cross-border trucking
operations, enabling it to access undisclosed
revenues and refined petroleum products and
partially pay international oil company (IOC) costs.
Yet, neither Ankara nor Erbil can fully honor their
commitments to each other. Barzani has been unable,
or unwilling, to control PKK activities inside Iraqi
Kurdistan or in Syria, particularly since the KRG is
currently pro-Turkish and the PKK and most Syrian
Kurds are not. Even then, it is uncertain if the KRG
wants to fully relinquish its PKK card. Just as
regional states are using the PKK against each
other, the KRG is using the radical Kurdish
nationalist group to leverage Turkey and assuage
Kurdish nationalist populations. Further, even
though Turkey has encouraged a Kurdish energy export
market,www.ekurd.net
it has affirmed that activities with the KRG are
part of local “border trade” and not representative
of official international agreements. As Turkey
supports Kurdish energy development, it also is
working with Baghdad to expand southern exports from
Basra through the northern line, potentially
bypassing the KRG.
The Turkish-KRG alliance may further be challenged
by the Kurdistan region’s rapid and uneven
development processes. Alongside the demand for
Turkish consumer goods inside the Kurdish north is a
strong nationalist current that is seeking greater
autonomy and real democracy — claims that counter
Turkey’s underlying conditions of its Erbil
partnership (limited Kurdish autonomy and a strong
security apparatus). Further, the growing
Barzani-Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) power and
different Kurdish party approaches toward Baghdad
and Maliki are breeding political polarization in
the northern region. Barzani’s recent appointment of
his son, Masrur to head the new $265 million KRG
Security Council has elicited outrage from
independent and opposition groups, and is likely to
be a source of future political bottlenecks and
tensions.
Turkey has not been able to parlay its Kurdish
partnership into a larger Sunni Muslim alliance that
could advance its political interests in Iraq
either. Ankara’s support for the Iraqiyya faction
may have brought together some Kurdish and Sunni
Arab elites into an anti-Maliki coalition and
provided sanctuary for Iraqi vice president and
current fugitive Tariq al-Hashemi. Yet this
coalition has been unable to overthrow the Iraqi
prime minister. In fact, since the Hashemi affair
and the failed no-confidence vote against Maliki,
Iraqiyya and the KRG have been further weakened in
Baghdad.
Even the politically expedient alliance between the
Turkish backed, Sunni Arab governor of Mosul, Atheel
al-Nujaifi and Barzani has not gained support of
their local constituents. Rather, this alliance and
Nujaifi’s recently expressed interest in the
ExxonMobil oil deal in Ninewa’s disputed territories
has deepened schisms with fellow Sunni Arabs. Some
have turned to Maliki and/or joined Shiite groups to
affirm their commitment to Iraq’s territorial
integrity and growing anti-Kurd sentiment.
These internal power struggles will continue to
unsettle Iraqi politics while allowing Ankara to
leverage competing energy ambitions. One possible
outcome would be to connect the KRG’s soon-to-be
constructed feeder pipelines to the existing Iraqi
pipelines. This could increase Turkey’s energy
import needs and pipeline tariff fees, potentially
expand Baghdad-controlled northern export volumes to
over 1.4 million barrels per day and give the KRG a
feasible and efficient way to access world oil
markets, particularly since an independent Kurdish
pipeline to Turkey is unrealistic. This option would
still leave Baghdad with the upper hand because it
would maintain control of payments, although the KRG
could influence export volumes and pipeline
security. A more likely option, at least in the
short term, is non-negotiation and continuation of
the status quo. Turkey could still gain by playing
off Baghdad and Erbil, although Baghdad’s northern
exports would be limited while the KRG’s oil sector
would remain dependent upon domestic sales and local
“border trade.”
Denise Natali holds the Minerva Chair at the
Institute for National Strategic Studies (INSS),
National Defense University and author of The
Kurdish-Quasi-State: Development and Dependency in
Post-Gulf War Iraq. The views expressed are her own
and do not reflect the official policy or position
of the National Defense University, the Department
of Defense, or the U.S. government.
Summary:
Turkey’s "zero-problems with neighbors" policy seems
to be working in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq,
writes Denise Natali. In five years, Ankara has used
its soft power to turn a once tense relationship
with the Kurdistan Regional Government into an
economically and politically profitable one, but
fragile regional alliances still play a major role.
Copyright ©, respective
author or news agency,
al-monitor.com
Top |
The opinions
expressed in this commentary are solely those of the
author
|
