Date: April 13, 2009

No: PR.7-D1309

At 12 April 2009, the reporter (Mr. Umit Abdulla) and cameraman (Abbas Mohammed Hasan) of the local Turkmeneli TV (TERT) in Kerkuk city were organizing to report a book exhibition in the faculty of Law, Kerkuk University. They were attacked by a group of students from Kurdish student Union. Both the reporter and the cameraman were severely kicked and insulted and the camera was shattered. The Kurdish policemen and the Kurdish soldiers have only watched the offenses without interfering to stop the attackers.

This attack on the local Turkmeneli TV (TERT) staffs in Kerkuk demonstrates clearly the unbalanced oppressive attitude of the Kurdish authorities and even activists in Kerkuk region.   

The oil rich Kerkuk region has been controlled since the 2003 occupation by Kurdish political parties supported by Peshmerga militias after occupation. Support of the occupier, resettlement of hundreds of thousands of Kurds and manipulating elections has made the Kurdish parties dominate the political and administration system in the province and remain the only decision-makers at exclusion of the original inhabitants: Turkmen, Arabs and Chaldo-Assyrians.

The security system is completely Kurdified, with the Iraqi army limited and the Kurdish militia distributed throughout the Kerkuk province. This has psychologically suppressed the non-Kurdish communities.

The appointment of thousands of Kurds and the enrichment of half a million incoming Kurds with large sums of money, and the granting of large numbers of government contracts to Kurdish contractors who employ Kurdish workers has shifted the economic balance in favour of the Kurdish inhabitants.

Having only recently left behind the tough guerrilla life, after decades in the harsh mountain regions, the Kurdish administration remains characterized by an authoritarian mentality, and lack of meritocracy. This has brought other burdens on the non-Kurdish inhabitants of Kerkuk in the Kurdified governmental offices.

The politicized Kurdish education and information systems have since 1991 taught the Kurdish generations that Kerkuk province is their fatherland which has been usurped by other nations. This increased the animosity of particularly Kurdish youth and convinced them to have the region at any cost.

Under such a biased condition:

ü       When the Iraqi government was totally absent in Kerkuk, the non-Kurdish Kerkuk population survived thousands of dramatic human rights violations since the occupation in 2003.

ü      The Kurdish political parties prevented the normalization in Kerkuk region and are now hindering the implementation of Article 23 which was, recently, enacted by the Iraqi parliament.

To convince the Kurdish political parties to change their unconstructive attitude in solving of Kerkuk problem, the international community should withhold their support, assistance and cooperation with the Kurdish authorities.

ارشيف مجلة تركمان العراق SOITM Stichting Onderzoekscentrum Iraaks Turkmeense Mensenrechten Nijmegen - The Netherlands soitm@turkmen.nl