February 04, 2008

Kurdistan file: KC didn't attend conference on Kirkuk

I track major developments going on INSIDE Kurdistan, as I cannot rely on US MSM accounts of what is going on with all that oil.

All eyes on Kirkuk! Many people are coming and going there right now ...

Hey! Yeah! The surge was working! Things are being normalized! The benchmarks are being met!

Let's face FACTS, folks. This region is dreadfully destablized and the US/multinationals staying there, at enormous expense, financial and SPIRITUAL, is a complete and utter folly.

Veeger


KC didn't attend conference on Kirkuk

this file photo shows the oil rich city of Kirkuk north of Iraq.

VOI

KC did not participate in the Turkmen-sponsored conference on Kirkuk.

Kurdish politicians and parliamentarians did not participate in the Turkmen-sponsored-conference held earlier today in the Iraqi capital Baghdad to discuss the controversial issue of oil-rich Kurdish Kirkuk city, a media advisor for Kurdistan's parliament speaker said on Saturday.

"The conference held in Baghdad on Saturday was not attended by parliamentarians from the Kurdistan Coalition (KC) or Kurdish politicians," Tareq Johar said.

"Every sect or ethnic group has the right to hold a conference of its own to discuss their issues within the Iraqi constitution," Johar added.

"We are waiting for the results of the conference and then we will comment," Johar said, providing no further details.

No comment was available from Kurdish politicians on the conference.

The Kurdistan Coalition, led by Fuoad Maasoum, is the second largest bloc with 55 seats in the 275-member parliament.

Earlier today, a conference was held in the Iraqi capital to discuss Kirkuk issue with the attendance of Iraqi members of parliament, ministers and members of Kirkuk municipal council.

Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution is related to the normalization of the situation in Kirkuk, Kurds seek to include the city in the autonomous Iraq's Kurdistan region, while Sunni Arabs, Turkmen and Shiite Arabs oppose the incorporation.

Kirkuk city is a Kurdish city and it lies just south border of the Kurdistan autonomous region, 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.", Kirkuk is historically a Kurdish city.

The article currently stipulates that all Arabs in Kirkuk be returned to their original locations in southern and central Iraqi areas, and formerly displaced residents returned to Kirkuk.

The former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein 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.

Under article 140 of Iraq's constitution a referendum must be held on whether the city secedes to control of the Kurdistan region al government KRG.

A referendum, provided for in the Iraqi constitution, was scheduled to be held by the end of the past year on including the city into the Kurdistan region, but the UN mediated to extend its time to July 2008.

Iraq's Kurdistan region includes the provinces of Erbil, Sulaimaniyah and Duhok. It has a Kurdish majority population in addition to Turkmen, Arabs, Christians and Chaldean-Assyrians, constituting one fifth of Iraq's 27 million populations, according to figures released by the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq.

And hopefully the very last such German restaurant, too!!

Self determination. A word lost in BuZh bafflegab. Let the Kurds decide who works with them.


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