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news
headlines
Bomb
in Iraqi Kurdistan kills boy, 4, wounds two others: police
Bahceli: Barzani's Statement Is Unacceptable How Kurdistan's first suicide bomber changed his mind Interrogations link Al Qaeda to Iraq Two hundred Iraqi Kurdish immigrants land in southern Italy Turkey, Iraqi Kurdish Tensions High Jalal Talabani Interview with Asharq Al-Awsat Iraqi Kurd Fighters Seen More Organized Iranian troops deployed on Iraqi border: Kurds Saddam's son says Iran not al-Qaeda behind Kurdistan Islamist group KDP Slams Berlin Embassy Seizure as "Terrorism" Barham Salih: The Radical group Ansar al-Islam Plans Attacks Talabani Wants US Date for Post-Saddam Poll U.S. Monitors Kurdish Extremists raq orders banks to be opened in Kurdistan Saddam will not stop me being a Kurd
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Iraqi
Kurds committed to baning landmines
GENEVA, Sept 17 (AFP) The two main Kurdish factions sharing control of northern Iraq have pledged not to use anti-personnel landmines, a Swiss non governmental organisation (NGO) said on Tuesday. The announcement by the NGO Geneva Call came on the sidelines of the fourth meeting of signatories to the 1999 Ottawa Convention on outlawing landmines. Geneva Call offers non-state parties such as rebels, irregular armed groups or dissidents the chance to sign a "deed of commitment" to stop using mines, destroy their stockpiles and allow verification missions. The local authorities in Geneva are the custodians of the documents. Abdul Rezzak Mirza, minister for humanitarian aide and cooperation in the regional government and the representative of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), symbolically presented papers pledging that the group would sign a deed of commitment. Siraj Barzani, who was due to do the same in the name of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), was prevented by the Syrian authorities from coming to Switzerland, Geneva Call's chairwoman Elisabeth Reusse-Decrey said. The two movements signed the deeds last month. They echoes the main principles of the Ottawa Convention on the prohibition of the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of landmines and calls for their destruction. Since the 1991 Gulf War, some 2,500 people have died and 3,200 have been injured by landmines in the northern Iraqi region, Mirza told reporters. Set up two years
ago, Geneva Call so far has signed up two Philippine movements, including the
Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement and the
two Kurdish groups, PUK and KDP.
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