In Iraq, Kurdish Peshmerga Has The Run Of
Oil-Rich Kirkuk
By Tom Lasseter
The
Knight-Ridder Feb 16, 2007
KIRKUK, (Southern Kurdistan) - Lt. Hiwa Raouf
Abdul is not supposed to be in Kirkuk. The oil-rich city, which many fear is
teetering on the brink of civil war, is off-limits to Kurdish Peshmerga militia
members.
And yet, on Tuesday, the slender, 26-year-old
Peshmerga officer breezed through one checkpoint after the next on his way into
Kirkuk, exchanging waves and salutes with Iraqi army soldiers and policemen as
he rode with a truckload of Peshmerga gunmen.
Abdul is stationed in the nearby Kurdish city
of Sulaimaniyah, where the Peshmerga enforce strict security through a series of
checkpoints, and his visit to Kirkuk came only because his commanders asked him
to escort a reporter there.
But the ease with which a pickup truck carrying
seven Peshmerga members, most of them wielding AK-47s, passed into Kirkuk says
volumes about the challenge of pacifying flashpoint towns like Kirkuk and,
ultimately, Iraq.
When he passed by the Iraqi army checkpoint on
the edge of Kirkuk, Abdul looked at the soldiers saluting him and said, "They
get their orders from the Iraqi army, but their loyalty is to the Kurds, to us."
As with Shiite militias in Baghdad, the line
between militia members and Iraqi security troops in Kirkuk is so thin that it
at times doesn't exist. And U.S. plans to build Iraq's security forces - a
process that has cost more than $15 billion nationwide - seem to have
strengthened militias instead of discouraging them.
The issue of loyalty with Iraqi security forces
is proving to be the Achilles' heel of American plans to stabilize the war-torn
nation. Without neutral Iraqi soldiers and police, an American withdrawal would
almost certainly lead to greater sectarian bloodshed than Iraq is currently
experiencing.
In June 2004, the American Coalition
Provisional Authority issued an order outlawing militias and calling for their
members to integrate into Iraq's security forces. An exemption was made for the
Peshmerga, provided that they remained in Kurdistan, a semi-autonomous state in
northern Iraq, and not move to outside areas like Kirkuk.
Armed groups across Iraq reacted to the 2004
measure by enlisting in the army and police and maintaining large contingents of
stand-alone militia groups, making them significantly more powerful.
Kirkuk is a tinderbox of sects vying for
control of an area with billions of dollars worth of oil, but the Iraqi army
isn't a neutral presence, and many of its soldiers make no secret that their
loyalty is to the Kurdish nation.
"I joined to defend my city and my people, who
are Peshmerga," said Iraqi Army Pvt. Kamaran Ahmed, a 31-year-old Kurd from
Kirkuk. "From the time of the first prophet God sent to Earth, Kirkuk has been a
part of Kurdistan and it will return to Kurdistan."
Ahmed continued: "If it is not returned to
Kurdistan, things will get very bad."
To make his point clear, Ahmed jutted his arm
into the air and said, "For instance, I have this watch on my wrist. If you take
it from me, I will do whatever is necessary to take it back."
American and Iraqi officials are adamant that
Iraqi troops are heading in the right direction.
Asked by e-mail whether there were concerns
about the Peshmerga influence on Iraqi troops around Kirkuk, U.S. Lt. Col.
Michael Donnelly answered: "No. Our relationship with the IA (Iraqi Army)
division is well established since our arrival here six months ago."
Donnelly, a spokesman for the 25th Infantry
Division, which is responsible for Kirkuk, continued: "When the soldiers join
the IA, they are taught in training and in day-to-day regimen of being a soldier
that sectarian lines are not for the army. They are an army of one, if you will,
for one nation."
Requests for comment from four senior U.S.
military public affairs officers in Baghdad were unsuccessful.
The dispute over who will ultimately control
Kirkuk, which has oil fields with reserves of at least 8.7 billion barrels, is a
contentious and potentially catastrophic one, with the city's Arab, Kurd and
Turkmen communities all claiming rightful ownership.
"The Kurds who surround Kirkuk claim to be
Iraqi army, but their extensive presence on the outskirts of Kirkuk is designed
to affect the ethnic balance of the city," said Ali Mahdi, a senior Turkmen
political leader in Kirkuk and a member of the provincial council. "They are
protecting their sect and working for the benefit of the Kurds in the city and
not the others. This is dangerous for the future of the city."
The situation has serious geo-political
implications: Neighboring Turkey, a crucial U.S. ally, fears that the Kurds will
eventually declare independence if they gain Kirkuk, a move that could lead the
large Kurdish population in Turkey to agitate for secession.
Former dictator Saddam Hussein displaced tens
of thousands of Kurdish families from Kirkuk, replacing them with Arabs, mainly
from the Shiite south.
Iraq's constitution provides for a referendum
to decide the matter of who will control Kirkuk by the end of this year;
meanwhile, tens of thousands of Kurds have moved into the city since 2003, urged
by Kurdish political parties to set up homes there.
And the Peshmerga have continued to have deep
ties with the Iraqi security forces.
"If the heavy presence of Peshmerga in Kirkuk
and its outskirts continues as it is now, it will lead to a civil war in
Kirkuk," said Abdullah al Obeidi, a Sunni Arab tribal leader and a member of the
Kirkuk provincial council.
After bringing a McClatchy reporter into
Kirkuk, the Peshmerga - literally, "those who face death" - troops next stopped
at an Iraqi army base there.
Iraqi army Maj. Shawqi Mohammed, a former
Peshmerga commander, was at the base, and he greeted the Peshmerga members
warmly.
"Kirkuk is Kurdistan; that is the only point
worth making. We have given thousands of lives for Kirkuk," Mohammed said.
Asked whether Kurdish troops would break ranks
if fighting broke out between Kirkuk's sects, Mohammed said, "It's true that we
are Iraqi army, but we are also Kurds. ... We will do whatever the Kurdish
leadership tells us to."
A McClatchy reporter interviewing Kurdish
troops in the Iraqi army during late 2005 heard similar remarks. The Iraqi
defense ministry issued a press release at the time saying there was no
substance to the issue of Peshmerga infiltration of army units in Kirkuk.
Senior Kurdish leaders have said in public that
they'll pursue only peaceful means to wrest control of the city.
That same leadership has intentionally stocked
Iraqi security forces with Peshmerga, said Fadil Haider, a senior member of the
Kurdistan Islamic Union, a small but powerful political party, and a former
member of the Iraqi national parliament.
The two main Kurdish parties - the Patriotic
Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) - have done so
as an insurance policy, he said.
"I can give you two scenarios: If Iraq is in an
all-out civil war, then the PUK and KDP have put themselves in a position to
protect Kurdistan by very quickly taking Kirkuk and making it a part of an
independent Kurdistan," Haider said. "Or, if we exhaust the peaceful, political
means of gaining Kirkuk for Kurdistan, we will take it by force."
Kurdish officials are confident that when
Kirkuk becomes a part of the Kurdish regional government, its security will be
maintained by Peshmerga, a process that presumably would be made easier by the
fact that so many Iraqi police and army there are former members, said Suzanne
Shahab Nouri, a member of the regional Kurdish parliament.
"The Kurdish Peshmerga forces are the strongest
(Iraqi) military force in Iraq," said Jafar Mustafa Ali, the minister state for
Peshmerga affairs - essentially a defense minister - in Sulaimaniyah. "If they
(Kurdish opponents in Kirkuk) don't respect the democratic process, we could
take over Kirkuk and they could do nothing."
