Turkmen Denounce "Kurdo"-Fascism and Al Qaeda Terror in Iraq as US-Promoted
Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis
November 17, 2008
In the present article, I republish parts of the eighth chapter that focuses on the US-led invasion of Iraq which – in the name of the fight against a menacing dictator – triggered an explosion of Islamic Terrorism, and turned the marginalized and unrepresentative chieftains of two tribal families Talabani and Barzani to merciless and menacing tyrants whose criminal paramilitary death squads massacre Turkmen, Aramaean Christians, Yazidis.
At the same time, the burgeoning infiltration of Al Qaeda among the pseudo-Kurdish leaders risks unleashing a most calamitous dynamics that will pull the entire Middle East into total destruction. In the last articles of the series, the criminality of the Talabani and Barzani death squads will be duly exposed, and the need for their immediate elimination emphasized.
The Turkmen City of Tuz Khormatu
By Mofak Salman Kerkuklu
Occupation of Iraq in 2003
On the 17th March 2003, the UK´s ambassador to the UN stated that the diplomatic process in Iraq had been ended. In parallel to this, the arms inspectors withdrew from Iraq. Also, the US President, George W. Bush, gave Saddam Hussein and his two sons 48 hours to leave Iraq or face the consequences of the war. Saddam Hussein refused to leave Iraq and prepared to face the USA and British forces. Nevertheless, one of the biggest blunders of the American administration in 2003 was to venture in an illegal war against the Iraqi people following an ill‐thought ideology conceived by a group of extremists known as the ´neo‐conservatives´ who pushed for the war with a plan based on lies and distorted intelligence about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, with the hidden objectives of regime change in Iraq, weakening the country and controlling its oil reserves, regardless of Iraqi interests. To realise their objectives, the neo‐conservatives invented a new and artificial classification of the Iraqis stating that the Iraqi people are composed of Kurds, Shiites and Sunnis, whereas in reality the Iraqi people are composed of Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen, who are either Muslims or Christians.
By confusingly mixing the ethnicity of the Kurds with the religious affiliations of the Iraqi Arabs, the American administration has encouraged these ethnic and sectarian groups within their armed militias to take the lead in the governing process under the banner of democracy. The world has since then seen and witnessed the tragic consequences of this Machiavellian plan and the effect of the US administration´s policy on innocent Iraqis!
After the intervention of the USA, and foreign occupation and regime change in Iraq, and despite the US administration's propaganda that they had brought 'democracy' into Iraq and that the Iraqis were now liberated and free, the reality is that the situation and the living conditions of the majority of the Iraqis, and especially the Turkmen, have dramatically deteriorated. Indeed, the Iraqis are forced to live under foreign occupation with all the humiliation that results from such occupation. They are exposed to all the dangers of the war, killing and injury, arrest and imprisonment, limitation of movement and freedom, shortage of food and medicines, lack of goods and basic services.
The interim Government
After the defeat of Saddam Hussein´s regime on 10th April 2003, by the US forces, hundreds of Kurdish militia poured into the Turkmen city of Kirkuk. The municipality buildings, government offices, military buildings, large hotels and a historical military barracks in the city (at that time used as a museum), which was built in the Ottoman Empire era, were set alight by Kurdish rebels, along with Turkmen shops and houses, including the land registry office.
Land deeds belonging to the Turkmen have been deliberately taken from the Registry Office and this makes it difficult for Turkmen to establish the original inhabitants of the province. The invasion of Kirkuk in 2003 by the Kurdish militia was a mirror image of the repeated events from 1991 during the uprising against the Iraqi government (Ba´ath regime) after Operation Desert Storm.
The Turkmen, Arabs and Chaldo-Assyrians had high expectations of the interim administration established after 9th April, 2003. The Turkmen expected to see democracy, fairness, tranquility, an end to discrimination, the right to self‐determination and an end to violence. Unfortunately, the opposite has occurred regarding the human rights situation in Iraq, in particular concerning the Iraqi Turkmen.
After the invasion of Iraq, an interim Government was established in June 2004 by the US administration and the USA handed the sovereignty of Iraq to the interim government, which was headed by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.
The Turkmen had high expectations of the interim administration. Mrs Songul Cabuk, who was inexperienced and unknown to the Turkmen was the only person appointed by the US administration to represent the Turkmen. The Kurds endorsed her appointment. The established interim government has only granted a single ministerial seat for the Turkmen, whereas eight ministerial positions have been given to Kurds: by appointing a single minister in the new government it was not truly representative of the Turkmen population.
The Turkmen candidate who applied for the post of deputy Prime Minster was completely opposed and rejected by the Kurdish coalition parties. Moreover, an interim committee was established, consisting of 55 members representing Arab, Kurds and others, but only a single Turkmen (Riyaz Sarikahya) was elected and this clearly shows injustice and under‐representation of the Turkmen in the newly formed constitution.
After the toppling of Saddam Hussein´s regime, the Turkmen have been subjected to campaigns by the Kurds in Turkmeneli, often more brutal than those carried out on Kurds by Saddam Hussein. The Iraqi Kurds have attempted by various methods to eliminate the Turkmen identity, especially from Kirkuk City, in order to disperse them into Kurdish society. The economic, political and cultural aspects of the Turkmen were completely changed when the Kurds brought over 600 000 Kurds to Kirkuk.
The city of Kirkuk, which is located 250 km north of Baghdad, holds strategic as well as symbolic value for the Iraqi people in general and for the Turkmen especially. The ocean of oil beneath its surface could be used to drive the economy of an independent Kurdistan, the ultimate goal for many Kurds. The Kurds hope to make the city and its vast oil reserves part of an autonomous Kurdistan, whereas the Turkmen, Chaldo-Assyrians and Arabs are fiercely opposed to the inclusion of Kirkuk in an autonomous region. Because of Kirkuk´s oil resources and its strategic importance, the fight over the control of the province proved to be one of the main focal points of the conflict in northern Iraq. Kurdish control over Kirkuk could fuel Kurdish nationalism in the region and undermine the rights of Turkmen, Arab and Chaldo-Assyrian residents in Kirkuk.
Indeed, the Kurdish armed militias, which are known as Peshmerga, and belong to the Kurdish political parties Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) of Mr Talabani and Mr Barzani, have been authorised by the US invasion forces and the American administration to extend their control beyond the Kurdish autonomous region in the north‐east of Iraq, further to the south and to the west to the Turkmen region, to occupy and control all Turkmen towns and cities, such as Kirkuk, Tal Afar, Tuz Khormatu, Altun Kuperi, Daqooq, Khaniqin, Kifri, etc.
Nevertheless, the systematic forcible transfer of the Turkmen and Arabs populations aimed at changing the demographic nature of northern Iraq is a policy that is commonly referred to as Kurdification (takrid). The Kurds have changed the demographics of the Turkmeneli rapidly. This process was involved by the resettlement of tens of thousands of the Kurds and, at the same time, driving out the Arab population at gunpoint. Kurdish officials bluntly declared that they do not want Arabs in northern Iraqi territories.
The Kurds, encouraged by the United States, the European Union, Russia and others, need to be emulated by the Iraqi Turkmen, who cannot afford to be isolated from Northern Iraq geographically, politically or, least of all, economically. Turkmen strongly believe that any settlement in Iraq that disregards the Turkmen nation would not be justified, would not be fair and lasting and would be doomed to failure. Unfortunately, now, the disposition of the Kurds towards Turkmen seems to be one of total disregard and suppression. The main objective and intention of the Kurds is to change the demographic structure of the Turkmen‐populated area and the Kurds have intensified their Kurdisation campaign in the city of Kirkuk.[1] Kurdish officials working at the administration of the Kirkuk municipality have been confiscating real estate and lands belonging to the town administration with a view to granting them to ethnic Kurds newly arrived in Kirkuk, who are not originally from the town. Kurdish parties have encouraged and offered financial support to all Kurdish families from outside Kirkuk to move to Kirkuk. Also, Kurdish parties have transferred a large number of Kurdish employees and police officers from the north of Iraq to be appointed in Kirkuk.
It was rather shocking for us to see the Nuri Almaliki government that was established by the US administration and the Kurdish leaders bargaining over Kirkuk and surrounding region, which has been for centuries and still is a predominantly Turkmen area. Kurdish leaders are encouraged by the West to pursue their objective of acquiring an autonomous region, but this; it would seem from the ongoing negotiations, would incorporate the Turkmen‐inhabited area and the Kurds have long been trying to degrade Turkmen.
What a bleak prospect for Turkmen, who have been looking for better days under a new democratic Iraq following the liberation of Iraq! It was utterly incomprehensible that almost two and half million Turkmen should come under the rule of four million Kurds. The Turkmen nation is entitled to have the same political, economic and cultural rights as Arabs and Kurds in Iraq. If the Kurds are to be granted autonomy, Turkmen should not be denied this right or – since they mostly live together in many places – the autonomy should be granted jointly to Kurds and Turkmen.
In a free and democratic Iraq, all the ethnic groups should be given representation, in central government and parliament, commensurate with their proportion in the population. The Turkmen strongly believe that any settlement in Iraq that disregards the Turkmen nation would not be justified, and would not be fair and lasting. It will be doomed to failure.
Unfortunately, because of the Kurdisation policy in the North of Iraq in general, and Kirkuk, in particular, in which the Kurdish parties are trying to change the demography of the Turkmen‐populated area, the Turkmen parties have expressed their opposition and have demonstrated peacefully against the new discrimination policies, on several occasions, in Kirkuk, Tuz Khormatu and Baghdad, only to be shot at by Kurdish militia and American troops, turning those peaceful demonstrations into a blood bath. In addition, the US forces have helped the Kurdish militia to change the demography of the area by appointing a Kurdish governor, Mr Mustafa Abdurrahman, in the Turkmen‐populated city of Kirkuk without election and without the consent of the population in the governance. The US forces allowed only Kurdish militia to carry arms in the north of Iraq, where they proceeded to terrorise the local Iraqi population. Moreover, during the election, the US forces had allowed over two hundred thousand Kurds from outside to be poured into Kirkuk City unabated, even though the election legislation clearly stated that no transportation movement was permitted between cities.
The USA have also arbitrary arrested Turkmen and abducted hundreds of Turkmen and Arabs in Kirkuk and sent them to prisons in Kurdish‐held northern Iraq. This was revealed by the Iraqi officials, US government documents and revelations from the victim´s families. These Turkmen and Arabs were transferred secretly and in violation of Iraqi law to prisons in the Kurdish‐controlled cities of Irbil and Suleymaniyah.
To suppress the Turkmen voice in northern Iraq, the Kurdish militias have established several puppet Turkmen parties to serve their own purposes. The Turkmen parties established by the Kurds are designed to divide the Turkmen people and are used to smear the characters of the real representatives of the Turkmen. Nevertheless, these puppet leaders have been appointed in various high‐ranking government positions. Moreover, these puppet leaders are being introduced to national and international conferences and to the world as the real representatives of the Turkmen, while they are clearly not.
Note
1. Article published by the Jamahir Al_Turkmen on 6 September 2003 on ITO-Habber.
Note
Picture: "Kurdish" terrorism is this. Picture taken from Mofak Salman Kerkuklu´s book.
Online editions of Prof. Dr. M. S. Megalommatis´ book on the "Turkish – Greek Relations and the Balkans" are available here:
http://community.webshots.com/user/turkeygreecemegalommatis (in Turkish) and http://community.webshots.com/user/greeceturkeymegalommatis (in Albanian)
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