{"id":7178,"date":"2008-11-13T03:00:35","date_gmt":"2008-11-13T00:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/?p=7178"},"modified":"2024-09-10T16:57:37","modified_gmt":"2024-09-10T13:57:37","slug":"kurdish-nationalism-undermine-the-rights-of-turkmens-arabs-and-chaldo-assyrians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2008\/11\/13\/kurdish-nationalism-undermine-the-rights-of-turkmens-arabs-and-chaldo-assyrians\/","title":{"rendered":"Kurdish nationalism undermine the rights of Turkmens, Arabs and Chaldo Assyrians"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Mofak Salman<\/em><\/p>\n

After the toppling, the Saddam Hussein, hundreds of Kurdish militias poured\u00a0into Turkmen city of Kirkuk. The Kurdish militias ransacked the municipality\u00a0buildings in Kirkuk, government offices, and military buildings. The land\u00a0deeds for the Turkmen have been taken from the Registry Office intentionally\u00a0and this makes it difficult for the Turkmen to establish the original\u00a0inhabitants of the province, large hotels and a historical military barracks\u00a0in the city (at that time used as a museum), which was built in the Ottoman\u00a0era, were set alight by Kurdish rebels, along with Turkmen shops and houses,\u00a0including the land registry office.<\/p>\n

The invasion of Kirkuk in 2003 by the Kurdish militia was a mirror images of\u00a0the repeated events from 1991during the uprising against Saddam Hussein\u00a0after Operation Desert Storm. In addition, thousands of internally displaced\u00a0Kurds and Turkmens were returned to Kirkuk and other Arabized regions to\u00a0reclaim their homes and lands, which have been occupied by Arabs from\u00a0central and southern Iraq. These returnees were forcibly expelled from their\u00a0homes by the government of Saddam Hussein during the 1980s and 1990s.<\/p>\n

The majority of the returning Kurds were not originally from Kirkuk but they\u00a0have been brought to Kirkuk with the help of the two Kurdish parties in\u00a0order to change the demography the city and to win the referendum that was\u00a0planned to be carried out by 31st December 2007 to determine whether Kirkuk
\ncan formally join the Kurdish administered region, an outcome that Arabs and\u00a0Turkmen in Kirkuk staunchly opposed this. However, the unresolved issue is\u00a0the future of Kirkuk an oil rich city in northern Iraq, which is a home to a\u00a0substantial number of Turkmens, Kurds, and Arabs, which makes it a powder\u00a0keg.<\/p>\n

However, the Turkmens, Arabs, and Chaldo Assyrians had high expectations of\u00a0the interim administration established after April 9, 2003. The Turkmen\u00a0expected to see democracy, fairness, an end to discrimination, the right to\u00a0self- determination and an end to violence. Unfortunately, the opposite has\u00a0occurred regarding the human rights situation in Iraq, in particular\u00a0concerning the Iraqi Turkmen.<\/p>\n

The Turkmen have been undergoing campaigns by the Kurds in Turkmeneli in an\u00a0often more brutal fashion than carried out on Kurds by Saddam Hussein. The\u00a0Kirkuk city holds strategic as well as symbolic value for the Iraqi people\u00a0in general and for the Turkmen especially! The ocean of oil beneath its\u00a0surface could be used to drive the economy of an independent Kurdistan, the\u00a0ultimate goal for many Kurds. The Kurdish militias hope are to make the city\u00a0of Kirkuk and its vast oil reserves part of an autonomous Kurdistan whereas\u00a0the Turkmens, Chaldo Assyrians, and Arabs are fiercely and staunchly\u00a0opposing the inclusion of Kirkuk in an autonomous region, because its\u00a0strategic importance, the fight over the control of the province proved to
\nbe one of the focal points of the conflict in northern Iraq. Kurdish control\u00a0over Kirkuk could fuel Kurdish nationalism in the region and undermine the\u00a0rights of Turkmens, Arabs and Chaldo Assyrians residents in Kirkuk.<\/p>\n

Kirkuk itself has become almost synonymous with the abusive Kurdization\u00a0campaign, which illustrates the persistency of the designs that the Kurds\u00a0have on Kirkuk. The fate of the city of Kirkuk has been one of the thorniest\u00a0issues of Iraq’s constitutional process. Under Article 140 of the document\u00a0ratified by Iraqis on 15th Oct. 2005, a referendum on the status of Kirkuk\u00a0was to be implemented in the province no later than 31st Dec. 2007. This was\u00a0to happen only after the Iraqi government takes measures to repatriate\u00a0former Arabs residents, resettle Turkmens and Kurds or compensate them,\u00a0implement the normalization and carry out the census in Kirkuk.<\/p>\n

After the toppling of Saddam Hussein regime, the Kurds intensified their\u00a0Kurdization campaign in the city of Kirkuk. The Kurdish officials worked at\u00a0the administration of the Kirkuk Municipality confiscated real estate and\u00a0lands belonging to the town administration and have granted them to ethnic\u00a0Kurds who newly arrived in Kirkuk and who were not originally from the town.\u00a0However, throughout Kirkuk and across hundreds of remote farming villages,\u00a0the Kurdish political parties did the job themselves.\u00a0The PUK had openly provided $5,000 to each repatriated Kurdish family. Tens\u00a0of thousands” of Kurds have resettled in the city and surrounding villages\u00a0after the toppling of the Saddam Hussein regime, many with the help of the\u00a0both Kurdish parties.<\/p>\n

The Iraqi Kurds have attempted by various methods to eliminate Turkmen\u00a0identity especially from Kirkuk City in order to dilute them into Kurdish\u00a0society. The economic, political, and cultural aspects for the Turkmen have\u00a0been completely changed when the Kurds brought over 600,000 Kurds to city of\u00a0Kirkuk. This was clearly organised and orchestrated by both Kurdish parties\u00a0in order to change the demography of Kirkuk and the Kurdish parties have\u00a0encouraged and offered financial support to all Kurdish families that were\u00a0brought from outside Kirkuk. The demographic structure of Kirkuk have\u00a0changed seriously and distorted as Kurds, backed by armed Peshmerga forces,\u00a0migrated into the city in large groups claiming to be original residents.<\/p>\n

To prove the veracity of assertion that non Iraqi Kurds have been brought in\u00a0and installed in Kirkuk as Kurds who were supposedly expelled by the Ba’ath\u00a0regime is the scandal which was discovered and denounced by the Swedish\u00a0Migration Minister, Mr. Tobias Billstrom in February 2007. It was discovered\u00a0that the Iraqi Ambassador to Sweden, a Kurd, and named Ahmed Bamarni had\u00a0been issuing Iraqi passports to non Iraqi Kurds from Syria, Iran, Turkey and\u00a0Lebanon.<\/p>\n

It was mentioned by the Swedish authorities that the Iraqi embassy in Sweden\u00a0alone had issued twenty-six thousands passports to non-Iraqis and that all\u00a0of these passport holders were supposed to be born in Kirkuk.<\/p>\n

Consequently, thousands of internally, displaced Kurds and Turkmen returned\u00a0to Kirkuk and other Arabized regions to reclaim their homes and lands, which\u00a0had been occupied by Arabs from central and southern Iraq. These returnees\u00a0were forcibly expelled from their homes by the government of Saddam Hussein\u00a0during the 1980s and 1990s. Mr. Barzani declared that 250,000 Kurds,\u00a0including Turkmen were expelled from Kirkuk while in actual fact and\u00a0according to the Ration Card Data Base (considered by the United Nations to\u00a0be a reliable source for information on the Iraqi population); some 12,000\u00a0inhabitants were expelled from Kirkuk under the previous regime, one third\u00a0being Turkmen.<\/p>\n

On the 10th April 2003, Kirkuk had 810,000 inhabitants and today, four years\u00a0after the occupation of Kirkuk by the Kurdish militia and the massive influx\u00a0of Kurds to Kirkuk, the population of Kirkuk is over 1.5 million inhabitants\u00a0and all newcomers are Kurds. The majority of the returning Kurds were not\u00a0originally from Kirkuk but they have been brought to Kirkuk with the help of\u00a0the two Kurdish parties in order to change the demography of the city and to\u00a0win the referendum by December 2007 to determine whether Kirkuk can formally\u00a0join the Kurdish administered region.<\/p>\n

The Kurds militia insisted that the constitution requires to carry out a\u00a0referendum by December 2007 to determine whether Kirkuk can formally join\u00a0the Kurdish administration region and the Arabs and Turkmens in Kirkuk are\u00a0staunchly oppose it since the demography of the city has changed\u00a0dramatically. Since hundreds of thousands of Kurds have moved to the city in\u00a0the recent years in what Turkmen and Arabs sees as a systematic campaign to\u00a0change the demographic structure of the city to guarantee a favorable\u00a0outcome in the upcoming referendum. In addition, how a referendum can be\u00a0carried out when the country is under occupation, the lack of the security,\u00a0stability and when the specific groups forced the legislation on the Iraqis.<\/p>\n

James Baker &amp; Lee Hamilton [ ] called for a major delay on a\u00a0constitutional referendum planned for Kirkuk’s at the end of the year 2007,\u00a0when the report was stated that the Kurds have altered the city’s\u00a0demographic makeup by bringing in more than 100,000 of their relatives,\u00a0holding a census could lead to regional conflict. The risks of further\u00a0violence sparked by a referendum are great and would be potentially
\nexplosive, a referendum in Kirkuk city could lead to violent clashes among\u00a0the ethnic groups and even a civil war across Iraq, that could eventually\u00a0lead to a disintegration of Iraq and also there is a great possibility the
\nintervention and involvement of Iran, Syria and Turkey in Iraq. The Turkish\u00a0Republic — which has always attributed high importance to independence and\u00a0liberty throughout its history -has been conscious of the need to preserve\u00a0and maintain its capability of protecting its sovereign rights, its\u00a0territorial integrity, stability in the region and its national and\u00a0international interests and any clashed in Kirkuk would provoke Turkish\u00a0government.<\/p>\n

The Iraqi Study Group Report on the Kirkuk issue that was submitted by James\u00a0Baker and Lee Hamilton considered by the Turkmen as a realistic,\u00a0constructive, well-structured and comprehensive in covered all aspects that\u00a0related to Iraqi issues and provided new hope for the future of Iraq. It\u00a0was the upmost important that the reference on Kirkuk status should be\u00a0delayed as was quoted in the Page Number 45, Recommendation 30 on the Iraq\u00a0Study Group Report, James A. Baker, III, and Lee H. Hamilton.[ ] Also see
\npage 19 of The Iraq Study Group Report, James A. Baker, III, and Lee H.\u00a0Hamilton.<\/p>\n

The New Iraqi Constitution was written under foreign military occupation and\u00a0mostly the non -Iraqis and the article 140 imposed that written and imposed\u00a0by the Kurds and which was added at the last minute to the New Constitution.<\/p>\n

Article 140: The article 140, dealt with very important and sensitive\u00a0issues, not only for the Turkmen of Iraq but for all Iraqis, except perhaps\u00a0for the Kurdish minority, as it was written by the Kurds and their foreign
\nconsultants to suit the Kurds special agenda and self interest, to\u00a0facilitate for them the kidnapping of Kirkuk, its annexation to the Kurdish\u00a0Autonomous Region, legalizing for them by the same means grabbing control
\nof huge oil wealth of this historical Iraqi Turkmen city and the Turkmens\u00a0capital city and main cultural centre for at least 900 years.<\/p>\n

One of the anomalies of this article 140 of the New Permanent Iraqi\u00a0Constitution is that it imposed a fixed time limit for its implementation,\u00a0stating that it must be completed before 31st December 2007. Furthermore
\nthis article 140 deals with the normalization process of the situation in\u00a0Kirkuk governate, a process which consists of three major steps, each one\u00a0with it is time limit:-<\/p>\n

1- The return to Kirkuk of all its forcefully displayed inhabitants by\u00a0the Ba’ath Regime during the Arabisation processes of the province by the\u00a0regime and the recuperation of their confiscated lands and properties to be
\ncompleted before 31st March 2007.
\n2- A new population census for the original population of the province\u00a0to be held before 31st August 2007.
\n3- A referendum for the future of Kirkuk to be attached to the Kurdish\u00a0Autonomous Region or not, to be voted before 31st December 2007.<\/p>\n

This article with its imposed time limits, a supposedly New Permanent\u00a0Constitution is unheard of: it is a Kurdish innovation in the Iraqi\u00a0Constitution. Kirkuk itself had become almost synonymous with the abusive
\nKurdization campaign, which illustrates the persistency of the designs that\u00a0the Kurds have on Kirkuk. The fate of the city of Kirkuk has been one of the\u00a0thorniest issues of Iraq’s constitutional process. Under Article 140 of the\u00a0document that was ratified by Iraqis on 15th Oct.2005, a referendum on the\u00a0status of Kirkuk will be implemented in the province no later than Dec. 31,\u00a02007. This will happen only after the Iraqi government takes measures to\u00a0repatriate former Arab residents and resettle Turkmen and Kurds or\u00a0compensate them, carry out the normalization and census.\u00a0The 140th article expired on the 31st Dec.2007, and according to the Iraqi\u00a0constitution that was established after the fall of the Saddam Hussein\u00a0regime, article 140 should not be modified or extended since it was imposed\u00a0a fixed time limit for its implementation, stating that it must be completed\u00a0before 31st December 2007, therefore at the end of the 2007 it was\u00a0automatically expired and had lost its constitutional validity since the\u00a0article was not fully implemented before the end of the 2007.
\nAlso the Iraqi constitution clearly stated that any extension or amendment\u00a0on the article needs an approval of 2\/3 of the Iraqi parliament’s members\u00a0and also the approval of the public in form of a referendum.
\nBut unfortunately the UN representative in Erbil Mr. Staffan de Mistura\u00a0recommended extending the expiry date of article 140 for a further six\u00a0months, this happened when he was invited to the Kurdish parliament. Mr.\u00a0Staffan de Mistura’s suggestion among the Turkmen was considered unwise and\u00a0biased, since he failed to pay any attention to the Iraqi constitutional.<\/p>\n

In fact, he bent to the pressure that was applied on him by the both Kurdish\u00a0parties in northern Iraq, but Prime Minister of Iraq Mr. Nuri al-Maliki did\u00a0not support the initiative because he stated that any extension of the work\u00a0to rule 140 after the time limit was unconstitutional.<\/p>\n

The Turkmen public thought it was more beneficial for the UN to open an\u00a0office in Kirkuk city instead of opening an office Erbil city in north of\u00a0Iraq, listening to the suggestions, demands and complains of the ethnic\u00a0groups in Kirkuk and rather than issuing an irrational statement.<\/p>\n

In addition, the article is an Iraqi internal matter and the UN\u00a0representative was not entitled and had no full authority and constitutional\u00a0right to change, extent and even to modify any article within the Iraqi\u00a0constitution. Iraq is sovereign country and it was not under the UN mandate\u00a0therefore a UN employee working in Iraq had not an authority to suggest,\u00a0recommend and an extension for any article within the Iraqi constitution\u00a0without prior consulting his main office and also without obtaining the\u00a0approval and consent of the people in Kirkuk.<\/p>\n

The Turkmens totally refused the recommendation of Mr. Stephan de Mistura\u00a0and was totally opposed by the Turkmen, thus the Iraqi Turkmen Front leader\u00a0Mr. S. Ergerj met with the Mr. Stephan de Mistura regarding the his\u00a0statements about the postponing the referendum and the ITF leader had\u00a0expressed his deepest concern about the extension of the Article 140 and\u00a0also Turkmen political parties condemned the action that was taken by the\u00a0U.N personal in Erbil Mr. Stephan de Mistura.<\/p>\n

In the middle of July 2008. Iraq’s parliament reached an agreement on the\u00a0Provincial Council Election Law, particularly with regard to Paragraph 24 of\u00a0the law, which deals with the election mechanism in the Kirkuk Governorate.\u00a0The postponement of the elections and adaptation of the division of Kirkuk\u00a0to the three constituencies that include the proportion of 32 % for Arabs,\u00a0Kurds, and Turkmen and 4% for Assyrians.<\/p>\n

Turkmen, Arab and Assyrians proposed equal distribution of provincial\u00a0council seats in the Kirkuk region – which is outside the Kurdish territory.\u00a0This was vetoed by President Jalal Talabani and his deputy, Adel Abdul
\nMahdi. Before the voting, the Kurds rejected secret ballot whereas the\u00a0opposition had requested a secret ballot and the members of the Iraqi\u00a0parliament voted open and secret voting. The majority of members have
\ndecided for secret voting and the deputy parliamentary speaker Khalid\u00a0al-Attiyah, a Shiite, said the secret ballot was unconstitutional and\u00a0accused the lawmakers of “arm-twisting.” On the 22nd of July 2008, decision\u00a0was made by 127 Iraqi members of parliament they voted in favour of the\u00a0Provincial Council Election Law, particularly with regard to Paragraph 24 of\u00a0the law, which deals with the election mechanism in the Kirkuk Governorate.\u00a0The distribution of power that include the proportion of 32 % for Arabs,\u00a0Kurds, and Turkmen and 4% for Assyrians.<\/p>\n

The security of the town shall be controlled by the central government\u00a0rather than the current military forces that are stationed in the town. The\u00a0security forces that are linked to the political parties have to leave. The
\nbill was approved by 127 out of 140 deputies that attended the meeting and\u00a010 of those members decided not to vote. Two of them decided to vote against\u00a0and one MP submitted a blank ballot paper but the Iraq’s parliament still\u00a0passed the law. The Kurds, along with the two deputy parliamentary speakers,\u00a0walked out of the\u00a0chamber after lawmakers decided to hold a secret ballot on a power-sharing\u00a0item in the law for the disputed, oil-rich city of Kirkuk. This was vetoed\u00a0by President Jalal Talabani and his deputy, Adel Abdul Mahdi. Nevertheless,\u00a0the Kurdish Brotherhood List at the Kirkuk Governorate Council held an\u00a0extraordinary meeting on the 31\/7\/2008. The 24 members of the 41-member of\u00a0the Kirkuk Governorate Council presented a request to the Kurdistan Region\u00a0Government and the Iraqi parliament to make the governorate part of
\nKurdistan Region as they believe that Article 140 of the Constitution has\u00a0not been implemented and that Article 24 of the Provincial Council Election\u00a0Draft Law does not meet their ambitions.<\/p>\n

Whereas the Turkmen and Arabs regarded this extraordinary session as\u00a0illegal. Also the Turkmen leadership has requested to replace the Kurdish\u00a0police in Kirkuk with army forces from central and southern Iraq, the
\npostponement of the elections and adaptation of the division of Kirkuk to\u00a0the three constituencies include the proportion of 32 % for both Arabs and\u00a0Kurds and Turkmen and 4% for Assyrians In the meantime, on the 31\/7\/2008, a\u00a0statement by the Turkish Foreign Ministry was released regarding the issue\u00a0of Kirkuk, which stated that the Turkish Foreign Ministry were concerned and\u00a0were deeply alarmed about the demand by some members of the governorate of\u00a0Kirkuk, regarding a Kurdish list to join the Northern Department.\u00a0The Turkish Ministry of Foreign affairs said in a statement: ‘We in Turkey\u00a0express our deep concern on what we see and what happened in the governorate\u00a0of Kirkuk where some members agreed to join the Council in Kirkuk to the
\nnorth of Iraq and Turkey’s position on Kirkuk would not have ever changed in\u00a0the present and future and the Arab and Turkmen called this moves by the\u00a0Kurd as a provocation.’<\/p>\n

Mofak Salman<\/p>\n

Turkmeneli Party Representative for Both Ireland and United Kingdom\u00a0msalman@eircom.net<\/p>\n

[1] Turkmen: The Iraqi Turkmen live in an area that they call “Turkmenia” in\u00a0Latin or Turkmeneli” which means, “Land of the Turkmen. It was referred to\u00a0as “Turcomania” by the British geographer William Guthrie in 1785. The\u00a0Turkmen are a Turkic group that has a unique heritage and culture as well as\u00a0linguistic, historical and cultural links with the surrounding Turkic groups\u00a0such as those in Turkey and Azerbaijan. Their spoken language is closer to\u00a0Azeri but their official written language is like the Turkish spoken in\u00a0present-day Turkey. Their real population has always being suppressed by the\u00a0authorities in Iraq for political reasons and estimated at 2%, whereas in\u00a0reality their numbers are more realistically between 2.5 to 3 million, i .e.
\n12% of the Iraqi population.<\/p>\n

[2] Turkmeneli is a diagonal strip of land stretching from the Syrian and\u00a0Turkish border areas from
\naround Telafer in the north of Iraq, reaching down to the town of Mendeli on\u00a0the Iranian border in
\nCentral Iraq. The Turkmen of Iraq settled in Turkmeneli in three successive\u00a0and constant migrations
\nfrom Central Asia, this increased their numbers and enabled them to\u00a0establish six states in Iraq.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Mofak Salman After the toppling, the Saddam Hussein, hundreds of Kurdish militias poured\u00a0into Turkmen city of Kirkuk. The Kurdish militias ransacked the municipality\u00a0buildings in Kirkuk, government offices, and military buildings. The land\u00a0deeds for the Turkmen have been taken from the Registry Office intentionally\u00a0and this makes it difficult for the Turkmen to establish the original\u00a0inhabitants […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4126,"featured_media":782325,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43,840],"tags":[165,234],"class_list":["post-7178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-iraq","category-mofak-salman","tag-turkmen","tag-turkmeneli"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4126"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7178\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/782325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}