KurdistanObserver.com

Turkmen Divided Over Report Of Mass Arrests In Kirkuk

Erbil, 17 June (AKI) - An American newspaper report earlier this week alleging that police in the Kurdish controlled Iraqi city of Kirkuk have arrested scores of ethnic Turkomen - as well as hundreds of ethnic Arabs - has divided Iraqi Turkomen representatives, with one goup, the Party of the Turkomen People (PTP) denying that the arrests took place. "There have been no detentions and no police campaign in Kirkuk, the PTP's leader, Erfan Kirkukli, whose party is allied to the main Kurdish political groupings in the area, told a news conference. According to the PTP official, the Washington Post who published the arrests claim was tipped off by the Turkomen Front, a group which says it is the ethnic Turkish minority's representative in the oil-rich Kirkuk region and in the rest of Iraq.

"The Turkomen Front is hiding behind these erroneous reports published by the newspaper. All that really happened was the arrest of certain individuals suspected of having links with terrorist organisations or of breaking Iraqi law," Kirkukli said.

The US State Department in Washington on Thursday said in had received information that the wave of arrests in northern Iraq had ended. In a lengthy investigative report, the Washington Post citing US military documents, claimed American soldiers were aware of the arrests and that in some cases had taken part in joint raids with the Iraqi police.

The Turkomen Front's relations with Kurdish representatives in Kirkuk have deteriorated since the fall of Saddam Hussein, with the Front accusing the Kurds of trying to dominate the region. During his rule Saddam ordered an "Arabisation" campaign in the strategically important region - encouraging Sunni Arabs from his powerbase to move there and alter the region's mostly Kurdish and Turkomen-dominant ethnic balance.

But Turkomen now accuse the Kurds of encouraging Kurdish migrants from other regions in northern Iraq to move to Kirkuk and claim it as an extension of the autonomous Kurdistan territory. Kurdish officials say the influx is made up of Kurds who had been forced out of Kirkuk during Saddam's regime.