Iraq Press Roundup about Kurds and Kirkuk

Middle East Time

August 13, 2008
By ALAA MAJEED (UPI Correspondent)

As the elections are being postponed in Kirkuk, the issue of the diverse city is still a matter of discussion in the Iraqi media. Kurdish papers covered the matter in a way that is supportive of the Kurds' point of view, demanding Kirkuk join Kurdistan.
The Iraqi Kurds have had to fight all of Iraq's governments and not only the faded regime of Saddam Hussein, the independent Kitabat newspaper said Wednesday.

Joining Iraq is better than joining Kurdistan.

The Kurds have always asked for the return of their forcibly "taken" rights, the focal point of most disputes.

Shortly after the 1970 agreement that gave the Kurds their autonomy, the Kurds began fighting again in order to annex the oil-rich city of Kirkuk.

Autonomy gave the Kurds the right to have a government of their own, use Kurdish as their official language and have the right to form their own laws.

The Kurds even carried weapons and fought the central government in Baghdad as well as minority ethnic groups and religions such as Kildo-Assyrians, Yazidis and others.

As long as there are Kurds in Kirkuk, the newspaper said, there will be the potential for rebellion, strife and demands from the Kurds that Kirkuk is a Kurdish city and must be joined to Kurdistan.

The demands by Kurdish authorities that Kirkuk join Kurdistan is in part due to the enormous amount of oil the city reserves, regardless of the interest of its people, Kitabat said.

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Kurdish papers dealt with the issue of the future of Kirkuk differently. The Kurdish al-Ahali newspaper, for example, had an editorial discussing the latest escalation that followed announcements about the provincial elections law in regard to Kirkuk city.

Solving the problem of Kirkuk between the possible and the impossible.

The escalation of the situation in Kirkuk, following suggestions that Kirkuk be divided into four electoral centers along ethnic lines, instead of one, has been critical and raised serious issues for the people of Kirkuk.

A unified electoral center gives the Kurds a better chance of having more prominent representation, which led Kurdish leaders to announce their right to veto the measure according to the constitution and reject the Iraqi Parliament decision to pass the measure July 22.

It is assumed the Kurdish residents of Kirkuk and officials in Kurdistan will try to annex Kirkuk, but it is also important to consider the demands of the Arabs, Turkomen and Christian minorities to preserve the city as a diverse and multi-ethnic one that stands independent and does not belong to any region other than greater Iraq.

The Kurds had demonstrated peacefully in opposition to the move to have four electoral districts. On the other hand, Arabs and the minority ethnic and religious groups had demonstrated in favor of keeping Kirkuk independent to imply diversity.

Iraqis have all the rights to demonstrate and protest. However, for a newly democratic Iraq it is necessary that the Kurds change their current policy of escalation and their negative attitude toward the Iraqi government.

The Kurds must remember the painful past and what opposition brought to their people because of the policies their government followed, the newspaper said.

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Shiite newspapers had their share of discussing the city of Kirkuk and its relationship to people from different ethnic groups and religions who live there.

Al-Bayyna newspaper of the Iraqi Hezbollah said Wednesday the escalation of the situation in Kirkuk is between Arabs and Kurds on one side, between Kurds and Turkomen on another, and between the Kurds and the ethnic and religious minorities who have lived in the city for centuries.

The oil of the Iraqi city of Kirkuk and the danger of division.

Kurdish calls to annex Kirkuk have clashed with what the rest of Kirkuk's citizens want, which is to have an independent city related to Iraq and not to any other city.

Arabs, Turkomen and the minority ethnic and religious groups, after the escalation of the situation in Kirkuk, have asked the central government to intervene, fearing an outbreak of violence due to the fact that the majority of the security forces are Kurds.

Escalation of violence, the Arabs and others suggest, could encourage other powers, such as Turkey, to interfere in the matter, something even the Kurds oppose.

Kurds calls the central government decision to postpone the provincial elections in Kirkuk a serious conspiracy and dangerous to the democratic process.

For the Kurds, the law of the provincial elections is acceptable, yet they claim the article related to the future of Kirkuk is unfair and against the rights of the Kurds.

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