Kurdish Herald VOLUME 1 ISSUE 3 JULY 2009 For Kurdish-Turkish Dialogue? DISPUTISTAN RESOLVING INJUSTICE IN IRAQ www.arsivakurdi.org Kurdish Herald CONTENTS Feature Disputistan- Resolving Injustice in Iraq page 4 Chief Editor Goran Sadjadi The Evolution of the Modern Electorial Process in the Kurdistan Region page 7 Editorial Board by Delovan Barwari Natsumi Ajiki Jeff Allan Iran: Protests against Editorial Manager election results or the entire establishment? Vahal A. Abdulrahman page 10 by Sayeh Hassan Design Editor Chira Bamarni Village Life in the Qendil Mountains by Thomas James page 12 Please subscribe to our No Country, No Identity- publication at www.kurdishherald.com the story of the Makhmour San Francisco, California refugees Boston, Massachusetts page 14 London, UK by Derya Cewlik Washington, DC Transforming Every House into a School-Interview with Abdullah Demirbas, Mayor of page 16 Sur District, Diyarbakir WWW.KURDISHHERALD.COM Special Dispatch: The “Heart of Kurdistan” is Bleeding by Vahal A. Abdulrahman page 18 Poetry & Art: The Mystery - Nepenî by Sibel Akman page 19 Cover Art by Angelo Lopezwww.arsivakurdi.org for Kurdish Herald FEATURE sectarian policies enacted by the previ- try, believes that the number displaced the districts). The runner-up was the ous regime. from the disputed areas is approxi- Iraqi Turkmen Front, which received In the Iraqi constitution which suc- mately two million. However, Dr. 54,213 votes (14% of total), with the re- ceeded the TAL, Article 140 is dedi- Muhammad Ihsan insists that without mainder going to various other slates, cated to the issue of the disputed areas, a referendum and a census there is no including Islamist Kurds. The district DISPUTISTAN with a specific reference to the text of adequate way to determine how many of Dibis, with an estimated population – RESOLVING INJUSTICE IN IRAQ Article 58 of the TAL. Article 140 gave people were affected by the Ba’athist of 40,000, sits on the northern tip of the new Iraqi government a deadline policies of Arabization and displace- the governorate of Kerkuk, bordering to complete the implementation stage ment. The Kurds, Arabs, Turkmens KRG’s administrative capital, Erbil. - 31 December 2007. Kerkuk and the and other groups seem to all claim cer- 75% of the votes from Dibis were won remaining disputed areas were to be tain disputed areas to be theirs, and no by the Kurdistan Alliance during the “normalized” by moving Arab set- public census has ever been conducted December 2005 elections. Also within tlers out of the regions and moving in these areas in recent times. the administrative borders of the formerly displaced families back to The city center of Kerkuk is undoubt- governorate of Kerkuk is the district their previous homes. A consensus, edly the most important of the dis- of Daquq with an estimated popula- followed by a referendum, would then puted, areas as its mixed population tion of 75,000 people. Daquq, like determine whether the areas would be is estimated to be approximately half most of Kerkuk, is a mosaic consisting incorporated into the Kurdistan Re- a million. The Kurds say that Kerkuk of Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen and others gion. Today, well into mid-2009, these is “the heart of Kurdistan”, while groups. During the 2005 elections, the important steps have yet to take place. Iraq’s Turkmens see it as their cultural Kurdistan Alliance won a plurality of center in in Iraq. The Arabs, most of the votesin the region, capturing 37% Within the landscape of Kurdish of the total. On the other hand, in the politics (both pre- and post-regime whom were resettled there for politi- cal purposes culminating in this crisis, district of al-Hawijah bordering the change), few things are more impor- Salahadin governorate, where the Arab tant than the issue of Kerkuk and the believe that they have been there for too long to just pack up and go back to tribes of Jibour and al-‘Ubaid reside, other disputed areas. Thus, in 2005, the Kurdistan Alliance received less the Kurdistan Regional Government the homes of their fathers and grand- fathers. than a 1,000 votes (not even 1%). In (KRG) established the Ministry of the event that there is a full implemen- Extra Regional Affairs with the specific tation of Article 140 and the referen- mandate of focusing on the disputed dum results show that the people of areas, and appointed Dr. Muhammad the governorate of Kerkuk choose to be Ihsan to head this new ministry. In an included with the Kurdistan Regional interview with Kurdish Herald, Dr. Ih- Government, the people of al-Hawijah san said that the single most important would become either remain an Arab factor impeding the implementation of minority within Iraqi Kurdistan or join Article 140 is the lack of political will. Salahadin governorate, with the latter Policies stemming from Arab national- being more likely given ethnic ten- ism resulted in the displacement of sions. people from their homes because of the That is part of the legal principle fear that if a place like Kerkuk, which behind Article 58 of the TAL and sits on 20% of Iraq’s known oil reserves Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution City of Kirkuk and continues to have a Kurdish ma- The KRG frequently claims that it has had an outstanding record of coex- – rearrangements of administrative jority, is treated as part of Kurdistan, borders ought to be addressed if need then the Kurds of Iraq could more eas- istence with non-Kurdish minorities within the current borders of Iraq’s be. Indeed, the current borders are ily separate from Iraq and form their a function of previous adjustments own independent state. Indeed, that Kurdistan Region. Kurdish authorities ollectively, the disputed demographics of these areas would injustice was committed against the made by the Iraqi central government fear seems to persist to this very day. argue that the non-Kurds of Kerkuk areas in northern Iraq change, giving the central government, original inhabitants of Kerkuk and a to serve its chauvinistic agenda, and it The people of Kerkuk and other Iraqis would be treated no differently than tell a story of injustice, the Arabizing force, control over these number of other towns and villages only makes sense that they could now inside and outside of Kurdistan were the rest of non-Kurdish Kurdistanis a story of people being strategic locations and, in many cases, stretching from just north of Baghdad all be reevaluated in an attempt to right led to believe that the removal of the (including indigenous Turkmen and forced out of their homes for the crime the rich oil reserves lying deep below the way to the gates of Dohuk, not far the wrongs of the past, which would Saddam regime would bring about a non-Kurdish Christian populations) of belonging to one ethnic group and their soil. The process of Arabization from Iraq’s border with Turkey. mean reevaluating the provincial as- new set of ideals, that these new ideals that are currently living within the not the other. For much of Iraq’s mod- was intensified under the reign of the signments of places such as Makhmour Following the removal of the Ba’athist would be part of a new order. This administrative borders of Dohuk, Erbil ern history, the places now known as the Arab Ba’ath Socialist Party (1968-2003), (moved from Erbil to Mosul) and Akre regime, the issue of Disputistan became belief seems unfortunately unwar- and Sulaymaniyah. “disputed areas” were subjected to poli- the darkest age in modern Iraq’s his- (moved from Dohuk to Mosul). Addi- a topic of focus for the actors in Iraq’s ranted, as almost two years have based In the center of Kerkuk, according to cies of Arabization, essentially meaning tory, a time when much of Iraq became tionally, outside Kurdistan, this could new political system, and was imme- since the constitutional deadline for the Electoral Commission’s certified that the original residents, Kurds and a mass grave beneath the ground and a mean reevaluating the current size of diately addressed through Article 58 of the implementation of Article 140, and tallies, the 2005 election results yielded Turkmens were forced to flee from their concentration camp above it. the Karbala governorate, which was the Transitional Authority Law (TAL). no progress has been made. a strong victory for the Kurdish par- decreased by the previous regime, and homes and Arab families were often Iraqi writer and professor Dr. Kanan Article 58 of the TAL mentions only the Dr. Muhammad Ihsan’s ministry, ties, with the Kurdistan Alliance list re- that of the Anbar governorate, which paid to resettle there. The objective of Makiya once aptly described Saddam’s governorate of Kerkuk by name, but which has relied on documents and ceiving 261,577 votes, which amounted was increased. the policies for those who carried out Iraq as a “Republic of Fear”; it was covers all of Iraqi locales which had recent surveys conducted by the minis- to 67.8% of the total vote (not including the injustices was the hope that the within that republic where an historic been subjected to Arab nationalist and 4 Kurdish Herald June 2009 www.arsivakurdi.orgIssue 3 Vol.1 Kurdish Herald 5 FEATURE con’t In Mosul, the demographics are even are comprised of mostly Kurds, Feyli of their right to remain in their ancestral more mixed, with a number of large and (Shi’a) Kurds to be specific. Despite nu- homes. Thousands of families were dis- small ethnic and religious communities merous terrorist attacks against them, the placed for purely chauvanistic and sectar- comprising the ever-so-mixed region Feyli Kurds in this area still enjoy rela- ian reasons, causing the new Iraqi politi- THE EVOLUTION of the known as the Nineveh plains.