LAST NEWS ABOUT KIRKUK/ KURDISTAN

[Anthea]

PUK opens investigation into ‘October 16 catastrophe’ in Kirkuk

The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), whose leaders have received mounting criticism for the fall of Kirkuk, has opened an internal investigation into what went wrong on October 16 in the oil-rich province.

The PUK held its first publicized meeting of the party’s politburo, headed by its deputy head Kosrat Rasul, since the Kirkuk crisis that saw Iraqi forces make large gains against the Peshmerga.

Rasul, who is also Kurdistan Region’s vice president, and other senior PUK members including family members of the late former Iraqi president and party’s head Jalal Talabani, have traded accusations back and forth in the aftermath of October 16.

They decided to open an investigation into the “October 16 catastrophe,” carrying out a thorough scrutiny of events and decisions made by the PUK both before and after the referendum, according to a statement published Tuesday night by the party.

The results will be made public.

The PUK said a regional plot, supported by the silence of friendly nations, coupled with the rejection of the US-backed alternative to the Kurdistan referendum, resulted in a catastrophe for the Kurdish nation.

This “regional plot” was partly successful due to “exploitation of disagreements between Kurdistani parties and the struggle within the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.”

US National Security Advisor, H.R. McMaster, said last week that the commander of Iran’s Quds Force Qassem Soleimani exploited a “power struggle” among the PUK ranks, portraying itself as the “protector” of the party.

Talabani’s eldest son, Bafel, has been widely reported as negotiating a deal with Soleimani and Iraqi officials that permitted Iraqi forces to enter Kirkuk without strong resistance. Although he is a PUK member, Bafel does not hold any official role. He denies the accusations.

The politburo members on Tuesday decided that official organs of the party should make decisions according to their respective powers, instead of letting “minor divisive groups” of the party make decisions.

The PUK has experienced internal power struggles for several years.

On the issue of the Kurdistan Region parliament, the PUK politburo said the party should play its legislative and monitoring roles in a more active way, noting that it was a key factor in reactivating the legislature in September in order to back the independence referendum.

They called on the Kurdistan Regional Government to begin talks with Baghdad, setting the Iraqi constitution as the base for any future dialogue with the central government.

“Unconditional dialogue should be conducted with Baghdad in light of peace and the cessation of war and away from aggression toward Kurdistan,” the statement read.

“As all Kurdistani parties and the Kurdistan Regional Government accept negotiations and the [Iraqi] constitution, what other excuse does Baghdad have to continue its military aggression, its economic embargo?” the statement asked in criticism of continued Iraqi military operations on various Kurdistan Region frontiers.

Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani said on Monday that such military operations will hinder talks.

The PUK also said the party should work with others to complete drafting a constitution for the Kurdistan Region, one that would establish a parliamentary system. It said it was time to end two years of political deadlock by resolving the presidency law.

The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) of President Masoud Barzani has long advocated for a presidential system. The party however, appears to have backed off the stance. Barzani said on multiple occasions in the run-up to the referendum that a future Kurdistan state should have a parliamentary system.

http://www.rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/2410201712

[Anthea]

How America sided with Iran over Iraq's Kurds
Editor's Note: (Michael Weiss is a national security analyst for CNN and author of "ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror." )

Top Kurdish official: "We never thought America would accept Iranian proxies using American weapons against their allies"
Michael Weiss argues the US response to Iraq's recapture of Kirkuk was deceitful and has alienated an important Kurdish ally in the war against ISIS

(CNN) Two weeks ago, one of Iraq's top security officials asked a trusted Kurdish intermediary to deliver a message to Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, the semiautonomous fief in northern Iraq which has been something of an American protectorate since 1991.

"Tell Massoud that war is coming if he doesn't back off," Hadi al-Ameri said, according to someone privy to the conversation. "Do not provoke us by counting on the Americans."

Ameri was referring to the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, which the Kurdistan Regional Government, or KRG, has controlled militarily for three years and politically for even longer. Iraqi forces had left the city in 2014 as their war with ISIS raged, but now that the terrorist group was on the run, Iraq had every intention of recapturing it.

On October 16 some 9,000 Iraqi government forces, including Shia militias under the command of Ameri, invaded and took Kirkuk in a matter of hours. With rare exception, Kurdish peshmerga, a professionalized guerrilla army, whose name translates as "those who face death," retreated northward in a snaking, convoy of Humvees, tanks and armored vehicles. Tens of thousands of Kurdish civilians also fled to Erbil, the capital of the KRG, where officials were plunged into a state of late-night chaos and confusion.

Long considered the Kurds' Jerusalem, Kirkuk had fallen without much of a fight. And what violence did occur was between two US allies, with American taxpayer-financed weaponry. American-made Abrams tanks operated by Iraqi forces fired on American-armed Kurdish peshmerga, who returned fire, destroying at least five American-made Humvees.

This is because in spite of its meek professions of neutrality, Washington did take a side in this conflict: that of Iraq's central government. But it did more than that by attempting to minimize the role its regional adversary, Iran, apparently played in the reconquest of Kirkuk. The commander of the Quds Force, the foreign expeditionary arm of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps, was reportedly instrumental in the Kirkuk operation.

Nothing better illustrates the incoherence of America's stance in the Middle East than the fact that it turned out to be on the same side as Major General Qasem Soleimani, who occupies a status within US intelligence circles somewhere between Professor Moriarty and Darth Vader. He and his proxies are believed by US officials to have caused hundreds of American fatalities and injuries on the battlefields of Iraq.

Yet it's hard to overstate what the Iranian operative has just pulled off. Not only did Soleimani out-marshal and humiliate Washington by brokering a cleverer and more cynical deal, which undercut its own vain attempts at conflict resolution, but he was then rewarded with US legitimization of his scheme. (Iran officially denied any involvement in the recapture of Kirkuk.)

All this occurred less than 72 hours after President Trump heralded a get-tough-on-Iran policy, which included the designation of Soleimani's parent body, the Revolutionary Guards Corps, as a terrorist organization. In his strategy statement, Trump said: "The Revolutionary Guard is the Iranian Supreme Leader's corrupt personal terror force and militia," and he promised, "We will work with our allies to counter the regime's destabilizing activity and support for terrorist proxies in the region."

Except the US just did the opposite in Kirkuk and alienated its longest and most stalwart counter-terrorism ally in Iraq, who, as the Kurds like to remind us, have never burned American flags much less attacked American soldiers.

"We had so much trust in America," a top Kurdish officer told me last week. "We never thought America would accept Iranian proxies using American weapons against their allies." One of his colleagues put it even more plangently than that: "It might be better if we just join Iran's axis."

Such are the paradoxes and unintended consequences of how America wages its never-ending war on terror — by alienating its friends and empowering its enemies — in the name of national security.

America's singular focus on ISIS

In the three years since ISIS stormed the Iraqi city of Mosul in June 2014, the United States has had monomaniacal tactical focus on smashing Sunni extremist head-loppers at the expense of underwriting its long-term strategic interests.

In a rush to dismantle the so-called caliphate, Washington has assembled and empowered a host of sectarian actors with antagonistic agendas who have been forced into a tenuous polygamous marriage of convenience. But now that ISIS is on its back foot — it just lost its de facto capital of Raqqa in the same week as the Kirkuk drama, in large part because of the spadework of another Kurdish-led proxy army — that marriage is disintegrating.

"For America, it's all about counterterrorism and ISIS," said Emma Sky, the British former governorate coordinator of Kirkuk during the US-led occupation of Iraq. "Across the region, ISIS isn't people's number-one enemy. They're more at odds with each other. The US still doesn't understand this."

For the Kurds, the power struggles are as much internal as they are external. The Kirkuk crisis would almost certainly not have happened without two precipitating events which fell within quick succession of each other.

The first was a referendum for independence held on September 25. A symbolic, non-binding plebiscite, and the second since the US toppled Saddam in 2003, it nonetheless drew opposition from every regional and Western government (save Israel's), which argued that the referendum violated the sovereignty and geographical integrity of Iraq -- concepts that hold mythical sway in foreign ministries more than they reflect brute reality in a deeply balkanized Iraq.

Conceived by Massoud Barzani and sold as a prelude to the world's largest stateless people, long reliant on the caprices and mercies of the great powers, attaining their century-long dream of establishing a homeland, the referendum was a domestic political victory in its breadth even if an international defeat. Ninety-three percent of Kurds voted in favor of independence, in defiance of just about everybody, not least of all Baghdad and Washington.

The second precipitating event was the death of Jalal Talabani, the first non-Arab president of Iraq and the eminence grise of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, or PUK, one of two shot-calling parties in Iraqi Kurdistan. Headquartered in the governorate of Sulaimaniya, the PUK had also commanded the peshmerga in Kirkuk and so the near-bloodless loss of the city on Monday can only have happened because of a prearranged agreement between that party and Baghdad.

Absent from the backroom dealmaking was the other, stronger shot-caller, the Kurdistan Democratic Party, or KDP, based in Erbil. This party is headed by Barzani and his family, who control the KRG's foreign policy and their own peshmerga paramilitary.

Kurds' 'Game of Thrones'

For decades, the PUK and KDP — which is to say the House of Talabani and the House of Barzani — have vied for dominance in northern Iraq, often aligning with their mortal enemy Saddam Hussein to get the better of the other in internecine disputes which have devolved into civil war. In recent years, the PUK has developed a close working relationship with Qasem Soleimani.

The plan was apparently set in motion around the time of Talabani's memorial ceremony in Baghdad on October 8. The dead leader's eldest son Bafel met with Iraq's Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, according to a senior KDP official I spoke to, who speculated that Bafel "saw the obvious, an opening in the Kurdish political parties to exploit in his family's interests." Days later, Soleimani paid a call on Bafel to reaffirm Abadi's seriousness, according to Reuters, citing a PUK official.

Bafel was almost certainly acting under the instructions of Jalal's widow, Hero Talabani, who along with her sister Shahnaz, represent what remains of the Talabani brain trust.

"Jalal was the tactician, the strategist, everything," Nibras Kazimi, an Iraqi scholar and former advisor to the US Department of Defense, told me. "Hero and her sister were the enforcers. They handled money, they handled keeping people in line." But now their patriarch is dead, and their futures uncertain.

Challengers exist within the PUK to assume Jalal's throne, chief among them KRG's Vice President Kostrat Rasoul Ali and, the governor of Kirkuk, up until Monday, Najmaldin Karim, who are seen as Hero's top rivals within the party. Perhaps not coincidentally, both not only opposed Baghdad's reclamation of Kirkuk but were also driven from the city the instant it happened — in Ali's case, after peshmerga fighters loyal to him put up some resistance to Iraqi forces.

"If I go back, my life is in danger," Karim told Bloomberg. "Even the night when all this happened, I had to maneuver carefully to go to safety."

In this telling, Hero has cast herself as a kind of Cersei Lannister of Kurdistan after her husband's demise, seeking to secure her political relevance and enormous fortune — the Talabanis are thought to be worth millions — by cutting a deal with Iran's master operative to undermine Barzani and scatter her enemies within the PUK. Not bad for someone unused to strategizing.

Bafel Talabani rejects the claim that the PUK and Iran orchestrated their own deal. "Unfortunately we reacted too slowly," he told Reuters. "And we find ourselves where we are today." (Attempts to reach Saddi Pira, the head of the PUK's foreign relations, for comment on this story were unsuccessful.)

One US national security official believes that machinations by Hero Talabani are the real story of the Kirkuk debacle. "Look at the crowd Barzani managed to draw in Sulaimaniya on the eve of the referendum," that official told me. "It was something like 25,000 people. Hero could never draw such numbers on her own. You think that didn't factor into calculations about what to do about Kirkuk?" Rather than submit to Barzani's dominance in the absence of her force-of-nature husband, she's underwritten her longevity by siding with Abadi and Soleimani.

Working in her favor is the fact that Iraq's prime minister is up for re-election in 2018. A Shia ally of Washington and Tehran, Abadi is looking to capitalize on his government's military victory against ISIS and brand himself the standard-bearer of Iraqi nationalism. The prime minister is facing fierce competition next year. Among his likely opponents are former prime minister Nuri al-Maliki, another Shia from Abadi's own political party, whose sectarian thuggishness against Sunni Iraqis helped invite ISIS back into the country; and Hadi al-Ameri, the Iraqi security chief who delivered the message to Barzani and is not just considered as close to Iran by US intelligence, but an active agent of Iran. (Ameri fought on Iran's side in the Iran-Iraq War under the aegis of the IRGC.)

To stand a chance at being given another term next year, Abadi had to regain Kirkuk — no premier can allow it to fall outside the hands of the central government. And he needed Tehran's help, from which he only stands to benefit in a forthcoming context with Iranian surrogate contenders for the leadership. "Iran wanted to expand its influence and remove the last obstacle to control all of Iraq," a KDP official told me. "The whole operation was planned and executed by Qassem Soleimani."

A busy Sunday

KDP officials blame the Talabanis for reneging on a late-hour agreement, brokered on the eve of the Kirkuk recapture, about how to proceed with negotiations over the fate of the city with Baghdad. At a meeting held in Dukan, Sulaimaniya, on October 15, Massoud Barzani, his son and intelligence chief Masrour, his nephew and KRG prime minister Nechirvan sat down with their PUK counterparts, including Hero and Bafel.

According to one of the attendees of the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, Bafel told the KDP that he had consulted Abadi as well as Americans and British diplomats about reintroducing Iraqi forces into Kirkuk. However, Bafel apparently denied reaching any formal agreement with Abadi; he was merely tabling a proposal for further dialogue with the central government and both powerhouse Kurdish parties.

Kirkuk fell within 24 hours.

According to the The New Yorker, Soleimani met that same day with PUK officials in Sulaimaniya, not long after the bipartisan confab in Dukan had wrapped up. "It's not clear what was included in the deal," journalist Dexter Filkins wrote, "but the speculation is that [Soleimani] offered a mix of threats and inducements, including money and access to oil-smuggling routes."

Whether or not the US actively tried to forestall such side action is beside the point because the Kurds now view it as an accomplice to the seizure of its Jerusalem, a psychic scar already being likened to Saddam's "Arabization" policies of the mid-1970s when forced population transfers changed the demography of Kirkuk from a city with a Kurdish majority into one with a plurality of Kurds, Arabs and Turkmen.

America's misfire

Reproach is the soap of the soul in the Middle East, where American allies have a habit of speaking melodramatically when slighted or jilted, only to then return to the fold when they once again realize that aligning with even an unreliable superpower is better than not doing so. (The Kurds are first among equals in this regard.) But American credibility has taken a lashing in the last week. And even an overly emotional KDP can point, convincingly, to a trifecta of falsehoods coming from Washington.

First, the Pentagon denied any untoward military buildup south of Kirkuk by Iraqi government forces in preparation for the city's takeover. On October 12, Major General Robert White, the commanding general of US ground troops in Iraq, told reporters that Iraqi forces, including Shia militias, were in positions to the south of Kirkuk but only in order to protect the city of Hawija, which had just been freed of ISIS, from a jihadist resurgence. "And they haven't moved since they occupied," White said.

Nonsense, said a senior Kurdish intelligence officer. "We were feeding solid intelligence to coalition members, including the US, about Iraqi deployments. Detailed information on locations, numbers, groups and types of weapons in the field — including American weapons — days in advance of the operation."

I asked the US Army Public Affairs office if General White still stood by his assessment that Iraqi deployments were only in Hawija on an anti-ISIS mission. A spokesperson for the office didn't respond in time for publication.

I was shown an email sent by a Kurdish intelligence officer to various US lawmakers on October 12. "We are facing an unprecedented military threat by Iraq and its Shiite militias," the email read, "[a]nd possibly an imminent attack. "Thousands have been deployed near Kurdish front lines. These areas have zero ISIS presence. They are armed with heavy weapons, some American in fact, including tanks, armored vehicles, mortars and artillery."

The office of one US senator who received the email confirmed its authenticity but stressed that information delivered by foreign intelligence service takes time to vet and corroborate.

Next, Central Command called the exchange of artillery and gunfire between some PUK commanders who resisted orders to evacuate and Iraqi forces a "misunderstanding" and professed not to take a "side" between Baghdad and Erbil, a position President Trump, who once famously mistook the Quds Force as a Kurdish entity, reiterated on Tuesday on the White House lawn.

Finally, the Pentagon denied that any Shia militias were in Kirkuk. This, in spite of the demonstrable fact that Hadi al-Ameri and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandes, whom the US Treasury Department sanctioned in 2009 and described as an "advisor" to Soleimani, were present for the lowering of the Kurdistan flag at the city's provincial council building, and the raising of the Iraqi one. (Al-Muhandes was convicted in absentia in Kuwait and sentenced to death for planning lethal terrorist attacks against the US and French embassies there in 1983.)

The head of one notorious Shia militia, the League of the Righteous, which in 2007 killed five US servicemen in the Iraqi city of Karbala, even publicly thanked the PUK for its cooperation in the Kirkuk handover. "We salute and appreciate the courageous position of the peshmerga fighters who refused to fight their brothers in the Iraqi forces," he tweeted.

The US has also, bizarrely, downplayed Soleimani's role in the Kirkuk affair. One State Department official told reporters last Thursday, "I'm not aware of any Iranian involvement in that, per se" — an assessment the Kurds find risible at best and iniquitous at worst.

The US dismissal of Iranian aggression against Iraqi Kurds also carries troubling implications in Syria.

A race-to-Berlin scenario is unfolding between US backed Kurdish-led paramilitaries and Bashar al-Assad's army in the campaign against ISIS in the eastern Syrian province of Deir Ezzor.

According to Lieutenant Colonel Rick Francona, the former military attache at the US embassy in Damascus and a CNN contributor, Washington's wishy-washiness on the Kirkuk question has sent a stark message to its other Kurdish allies in the Syrian Democratic Forces, as the US-backed forces are called: "We may not be there to protect you, either."

"Once ISIS has lost all or most of its territory in Syria as it has in Iraq, the Syrian regime will attempt to reassert its control over the areas now held by the SDF," Francona told me. "The Iraqis have set a precedent for that."

And if Assad and his Soleimani-built militias try to reclaim territory gained by the Syrian Kurds, will the U.S. defend or abandon its friends in that fight?

"There is no doubt that Barzani overreached with his ill-timed referendum and his belief in America's unqualified support for him," said Sir John Jenkins, the former British ambassador to Iraq. "But it should never have got to this point. It may not be about Iran for Abadi. But sure as hell it's about Iran for Iran. They must be loving it."

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2017/10/24/opin ... index.html

[Anthea]

The previous article is very interesting and so far seems to be the ONLY article to mention the fact that the recent referendum is the second since the US toppled Saddam in 2003

I was beginning to think that I was the only person who remembered the earlier mini-referendum - must have been 10 years ago - and 98% of Kurds voted for independence

Far from rushing things, I think Barzani waited to long to hold the recent referendum and he failed to declare independence immediately after the recent vote

Barzani was too trusting, he thought that he would be able to negotiate a peaceful secession from Iraq as the UK is attempting with it's withdrawal from the EU

Obviously Barzani did not expect Kurds to turn against their Kurdish brothers especially as the overall majority of Kurds have just voted for independence

Never give up hope KURDISTAN will be free sooner than most people think

[Anthea]

UN offers to facilitate Erbil-Baghdad talks

The ongoing confrontation between Erbil and Baghdad, including military clashes, are a continuation of the same problems that have remained unresolved between the two, “including deficiencies in the implementation of the Iraqi Constitution,” the head of the UN’s mission in Iraq stated on Tuesday, offering to facilitate talks.

The most recent negative dive in the relationship between Kurdistan and Iraq was sparked by the Kurdistan Region’s decision to hold a vote on independence, said Jan Kubis.

“Challenged by the unilaterally declared independence referendum Baghdad has taken steps to re-assert the constitutional order, re-establish the federal authority,” he stated, lamenting the fracturing of the bonds that had brought Kurds and Iraqis together to fight first Saddam Hussein and then ISIS.

Kubis called for a cessation of military activities and de-escalation of tensions, including “ending public inflammatory statements.”

He suggested Erbil and Baghdad coordinate on providing security in the disputed areas, while “respecting the integrity of the Green Line of 2003” and beginning negotiations within the framework of the Iraqi constitution.

He said the UN is ready to assist in dialogue between the two governments, “if requested” by both sides.

Kubis was in Erbil where he met with Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani on Tuesday.

Barzani thanked Kubis for his visit, saying that the Kurdistan Region has always been ready for “serious dialogue” with Baghdad and the UN and Coalition states have a “necessary” role in creating conditions for talks.

Barzani stressed that military maneuvers must be stopped “as they don’t serve the peace and security of the region, but will increase problems.”

Iraqi forces and mainly Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi took control from the Peshmerga of the disputed areas of Kirkuk, Diyala, and Nineveh provinces last week. Clashes have continued this week, with the Peshmerga reporting they repelled Iraqi attacks near Rabia and Makhmour on Tuesday.

http://www.rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/241020179

[Anthea]

KRG offers to freeze outcome of independence referendum to begin dialogue

The Kurdistan Regional Government has offered to freeze the results of the Kurdish independence referendum to give open dialogue a chance with Baghdad on the outstanding issues between the two governments on the basis of the Iraqi constitution.

A statement published by the Kurdish government Wednesday morning read that they do not want war and bloodshed to continue between the Kurdish and Iraqi forces. They have therefore decided to offer to “freeze the outcome of the referendum that was held in Iraqi Kurdistan.”

It also said that they will immediately announce a ceasefire and stop every military operation in the Kurdistan Region.

The statement continued to say that they are ready to “begin an open dialogue between the Kurdistan Regional Government and the federal government on the basis of the Iraqi constitution.”

The Kurdistan Region held a referendum on September 25 when 92.7 percent of ballots cast indicated a 'Yes' vote on independence from Iraq. Since that time, the federal government has taken punitive measures and taken control of oil-rich disputed or Kurdistani areas claimed by Erbil and Baghdad.

Translation of the full text of the statement:

The dangerous situation and tension that faces Iraq and Kurdistan forces all of us to live up to the historical responsibility and to not allow the situation to lead to further war and confrontation between the Iraqi forces and the Peshmerga.

The aggression and the confrontation between the Iraqi forces and the Peshmerga since October 16, 2017 has caused damage to both sides. It may also result in continued bloodshed and result in cutting the social relations between the Iraqi components.

It is a fact that a war between the two sides will not have a winner. It will instead lead both sides to great damages in all aspects of life. That is why, from the perspective of our responsibility towards the people of Kurdistan and Iraq, we propose the following to the government of Iraq, the Iraqi public opinion, and to the world:

The immediate cessation of fighting and every kind of military operations in the Kurdistan Region.

Freezing the outcome of the referendum that was held in the Iraqi Kurdistan.

Beginning an open dialogue between the Kurdistan Regional Government and the federal government on the basis of the Iraqi constitution.

Kurdistan Regional Government

http://www.rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/2410201713

[Anthea]

The Kurdish test

Iran’s mullahs are betting that Trump, like Obama, will choose appeasement

In a just world, the Kurds would have a state of their own. Their culture is ancient. They speak a distinctive language. They have a homeland, Kurdistan, ruled for centuries by Arabs, Turks and Persians — foreigners and oppressors all.

After the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I, the victorious British and French created new Arab nation-states and put in motion a process that would lead to the restoration of a Jewish nation-state. But the Kurds — they got nothing.

In 1992 following the Gulf War, the United States, along with Britain and France, set up a no-fly zone over the Kurdish region in northern Iraq. The goal was to protect the Kurds from Saddam Hussein, whose genocidal war against the Kurds included a chemical weapons attack in the Kurdish city of Halabja four years earlier.

When Americans invaded Iraq in 2003, the Kurds greeted them as liberators. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) began to diligently nation-build, establishing the institutions and infrastructure necessary for independent statehood.

I don’t mean to oversell: The KRG has not become a democracy. Corruption is reportedly rampant — this is still the Middle East. Kurdish leaders, divided among themselves, have made mistakes.

Most recently, they held a referendum on independence. The results were no surprise. More than 9 out of 10 Kurds want self-determination. The government in Baghdad won’t let them go without a fight. And the U.S., which is invested in a unitary Iraq, doesn’t want them to leave. Predictably, the referendum provoked the rulers of Turkey and Iran, who are adamant that their Kurdish subjects get no big ideas.

Still, Kurdish society is open and tolerant. Kurdish schools actually educate young people. Nowhere in the so-called Muslim world will you find a people more pro-American. The Kurdish military, the Peshmerga, has long been a reliable U.S. partner. In recent days, it has often — and bravely — taken the point against the Islamic State.

And now the Kurds are imperiled. Here’s what’s happened: On Oct. 13, President Trump announced his Iran strategy. He declined to recertify the nuclear arms deal concluded by his predecessor. Among the reasons: Iran’s compliance cannot be verified so long as international inspectors are barred from the regime’s military facilities.

The president also is unwilling to turn a blind eye to Iran’s continuing development of missiles designed to deliver nuclear warheads, the “sunset” clauses that legitimize the mullah’s nuclear weapons program over time, and the terrorism that those mullahs sponsor. Notably, he designated Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization.

The Iranian response has been more than merely rhetorical. On Oct. 16, Iraqi forces, over which Iran’s rulers now exercise considerable influence, and Shia militias, many of them Iranian-backed, drove Kurdish troops out of oil-rich Kirkuk. According to credible reports, Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the commander of foreign operations for the IRGC, was on hand to personally coordinate the operation.

Though Kirkuk is beyond the de facto borders of the KRG, Kurds have long viewed it as the Jerusalem of their homeland. It was a Kurdish-majority city until the Saddam regime determined to “Arabize” it, not least through population transfers.

In 2014, however, when the Islamic State was on the march, Iraqi government forces abandoned Kirkuk. The Peshmerga quickly filled the vacuum, defending the city and holding it ever since.

By orchestrating the taking of Kirkuk, Iran’s rulers are testing Mr. Trump. They are betting that, despite the tough talk, he won’t have the stomach to do what is necessary to frustrate their neo-imperialist ambitions.

In the end, they think he will attempt to appease and accommodate them as did President Obama. Mr. Trump reinforced that conviction when, in response to the fighting in Kirkuk, he said his administration was “not taking sides, but we don’t like the fact that they’re clashing.”

Over the weekend, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, the Iranian Parliament’s general director for international affairs, tweeted that Iraqi government troops “will return Erbil to the united Iraq easier than Kirkuk, just within minutes.” Erbil is the capital of the KRG. On Tuesday, Shia militias launched an offensive against Kurdish troops near the Turkish frontier.

It’s essential that Mr. Trump make clear that further threats to the security and integrity of the Kurdish region will not be countenanced, that any advance on Erbil will be met with stiff sanctions and, if necessary, force. The U.S. should insist that all military operations cease immediately and that negotiations between Baghdad and Kurdish leaders commence under American auspices.

Anything less will be interpreted as acquiescence to the Islamic republic’s drive to impose its brand of jihadism and Islamism on its neighbors and, in due time, far beyond.

To make America great again requires demonstrating that America is the best friend and the worst enemy any nation can have. During the Obama years, the opposite seemed to be the case. If aligning with the U.S. comes to be viewed as a chump’s game no matter who is in the White House, the U.S. will end up with no friends. It will have a growing list of emboldened enemies instead.

In a just world, Iran’s theocrats would have appreciated the fact that President Obama reached out to them in a spirit of respect and reconciliation. In a just world, skilled diplomats would devise elegant power-sharing formulas that all sides would embrace in the interest of peace and stability. In a just world, the Kurds would have a right to self-determination.

But we don’t live in a just world. By now, that should be glaringly obvious.

The Kurdish test

Clifford D. May is president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and a columnist for The Washington Times.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/20 ... mps-moves/

[Anthea]

After the referendum: What next for the Kurdish Region?

The days surrounding the Kurdish independence referendum have been filled with feverish commentary, speculation and in some cases, mis-information about the situation on the ground. Subsequent events in Kirkuk and the disputed territories caught many commentators off-guard, showing that if anything, many people had not been paying attention to the nuances of Iraqi-Kurdish politics.

Kirk Sowell, long time analyst of Iraqi politics and head of advisory firm Utica Risk Services, who publish the Inside Iraqi Politics newsletter, was one of the few analysts to correctly warn that dramatic events were about to unfold, not simply a vote and some political disagreements. Here we ask him for his take on what happened, and what we might expect in the coming days and months:

Q: The Kurdish people have certainly been through a lot of suffering historically. They have their own language and culture. Is it not time they had a state of their own? What are people missing in all this?

KS: There is no question that the Kurds are a separate people, not merely a minority, with their own separate language, culture and national identity. And this separation is growing with time, as young people in Kurdistan are not learning Arabic. I’d estimate that no more than one in 20 who grew up inside the Kurdistan Region’s education system are now capable of engaging in a conversation in Arabic. So in a generation they won’t even be capable of speaking to Iraqi Arabs, even if they want to.

Yet forming a state is much more complicated than that, and how you view it depends on where you sit. I’d divide these perspectives into the foreign and domestic views.

For a Westerner like myself who does not identify with any of the groups involved but whose country has national interests, this just isn’t enough. The referendum itself threatened the US position in Iraq because the polarization it created was a political boon to the pro-Iran, anti-American Shia factions. Prime Minister Hayder al-Abadi is the only real pillar holding up US interests in Iraq, and the fact that he had worked with Masud Barzani fighting terrorism, meeting publicly with him, it threatened Abadi, even more so because of the inflammatory manner in which Barzani used it to justify annexing ethnically-mixed “disputed territories” outside the Kurdistan Region. Abadi has in fact protected himself from this by taking a hard line, and the reaction Abadi has led turned Barzani’s triumphant referendum into catastrophe.

Thus US officials have been right to stand by Baghdad in the recent Kirkuk crisis. There is a huge amount of anti-American propaganda in Iraq’s Shia media about the US secretly being behind the referendum, plotting to create a “second Israel” and the like. Those who advocate US support for a Kurdish state now are falling into a trap.

Yet there is this alternative foreign view, that the Kurds’ “moral right” overrides these considerations and that the United States should champion an oppressed people. But here’s my question: let’s suppose we write off Iraq and take up the Kurdish cause, are you willing to next go to war with Turkey for it? Because championing a Kurdish state in such a manner would cause heads to explode in Ankara faster than you can say “AKP.” Thus even if you don’t hold to my Richilieuen worldview, you may not be interested in political risk, but political risk is sure interested in you.

Then there is the domestic view. For the Kurds, their aspirations are reasonable, and I’d want what they want were I in their shoes. But among Iraqi Arabs the predominant view is that Kurdistan is part of Iraq, and the reaction against the referendum has solidified this view. Note how Abadi’s rhetoric has evolved – until Barzani’s visit to Kirkuk on September 12, Abadi took a relatively soft line, claiming that the problem was having a unilateral referendum and the constitution didn’t allow it, but he didn’t object personally.

Yet since mid-September Abadi has used very hardline rhetoric, repeatedly comparing Kurdish nationalism to Baathism, racism, and even, in one speech, to Nazism. And the demand to push the Kurds back to 2003 border lines, that was extreme two months ago. It is now mainstream and Abadi is championing it. Of course Abadi always emphasizes the rights of the Kurds as Iraqi citizens, using phrases like “our people in Kurdistan.” But these soft phrases often don’t translate on the ground.

Q: There has been talk of renewing the mandate of UNAMI to deal with the crisis of disputed territory. But UNAMI made an apparently very detailed plan in 2009, albeit with few recommendations, on the 15 disputed districts. It seemed to be forgotten about. Are we further away from, or closer to, a UN backed solution?

KS: We are further away from it given the events of the past month. If I’d done this interview earlier, there are steps I would have proposed to incrementally resolve the matter, depending on the local population. For example, one could imagine resolving Ninawa’s conflicts by giving Sinjar and the Ninawa Plains autonomy status for ten years and then a referendum monitored by the UN. The problem until now has been that the dominance of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and its authoritarian practices made a referendum in these areas not credible. In principle this could be done now.

The problem is that the mistakes made by Kurdish leaders over the past few months have shifted the balance of power in favor of Baghdad. And this undermines any real possibility for a negotiated solution. As recently as October 12 or so it could have been different – Baghdad was only demanding a return to June 2014 lines of control, not April 2003 lines. If the Kurds had compromised then, when their relative leverage was greater, they could have negotiated a coordinated pullback and some shared role. The only significant area outside of KRG borders the KDP still control is Alqosh and nearby parts of the Ninawa Plains. And right now Baghdad is feeling so confident that this just isn’t enough to give the KDP much leverage. Given the intense resentment which exists against them, the KDP could end up going from near total domination of northern Ninawa to total exclusion.

What is realistic now: if Baghdad is wise, it will grant broad autonomy for Kirkuk, Sinjar and the Ninawa Plains. There are initial signs that Baghdad is letting local Yezidi groups take over in Sinjar, and this is good. Southern, Shia-dominated provinces are constantly complaining about the heavy dead hand of central government administration; no one anywhere in Iraq seems to want to have their local affairs governed from the capital. But with the Kurdish collapse, nothing will keep Baghdad from suffocating these areas if it reverts to centralization.

As for the KDP’s main rival, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), they have negotiated a deal, but waited until October 15 when the pressure was overwhelming and they were staring federal forces across battle lines. So while the PUK looks like it will end up with a role in Kirkuk under the label of “joint responsibility,” they will go from having total dominance to being Baghdad’s junior partner.

Q: Where is Russia in all of this? Much has been made of their energy investments in the KRI--and while there has been pre-financing, a lot has not come into fruition yet. Russia also does a lot of business in southern Iraq, for example in the supergiant field West Qurna 2. They've sold Iraq billions of dollars' worth of weapons--and sent a much smaller amount of arms to the Kurds. Might they lose Baghdad as a friend and gain an ally in Erbil?

KS: In short, no. Whereas Russian policy in Syria is ideological, elsewhere in the region, and especially in Iraq, it is mercantile. This isn’t the Soviet Union creating puppets everywhere, and the Russians are shrewd enough to have spoken with Baghdad about anything they do in the KRG beforehand. Notice the public reaction from Baghdad to Russia’s deals with the KRG, in contrast to Turkey – silence. This talk of Russia “bankrolling” Kurdish independence never had any basis, and totally misunderstood Russia. They were just getting a piece of the long-term action, and Iraqi oil will continue to flow into Turkey regardless. Moscow and Baghdad have a mutual interest in maintaining their relationship and nothing will disturb it.

Q: Are we looking at another Kurdish civil war similar to the 94-96 period? Or something more similar to the collapse of the 1970 autonomy agreement, with the KDP feeling betrayed by the central government? Maybe these historical comparisons are of limited use now?

KS: What I see is not a new intra-Kurdish shooting war but rather just a period of internal fragmentation. Even before the referendum, the PUK and Gorran were both trying to use budget debates in Baghdad to limit Barzani. So Barzani’s missteps have given them a huge opening. Furthermore it is clear from their statements in Iraq’s Arab media in recent days that they realize this themselves. I wouldn’t even exclude the possibility of a new region forming in east Kurdistan which is internally autonomous but closer to Baghdad than Irbil politically. Even if the KRG doesn’t formally break up, something like this de facto is likely.

Q: What is the endgame for Barzani now?

KS: I think the more relevant question is, what is the endgame for the Kurds? I think they need to focus on developing democratic institutions, the rule of law and a real non-oil economy, and give time for emotions to cool down. Arab acceptance of Kurdish independence – just the three provinces, not the disputed territories – has been growing in recent years, although the polarization around the referendum has set that back. So I think the Kurds need to take a decade to restructure their affairs within federal Iraq, and try with a less divisive approach next time.

As for Barzani and the KDP, right now their endgame appears to be doubling-down on the propaganda effort that failed before the referendum, now trying to paint Baghdad’s reaction as being all about Iran in the hope of baiting the Trump Administration into intervening on their behalf. But while the Iranian role matters, it is secondary, and outside of people who listen to a certain echo chamber, this isn’t working. So at some point they need to realize that having burned bridges with both Baghdad and Turkey while alientating the United States, all at the same time, they need to rethink their entire approach. They have no leverage or any real power, so they just need to start talking to people, instead of talking at them.

Q: How will these events affect the 2018 elections or is it too early to tell?

KS: If the election were held now, Abadi would be in very good position. But things can change, and also bear in mind there is a parallel political crisis in Baghdad over the formation of the new electoral commission which could result in elections being delayed. And if that happens, it would be very destabilizing for the country and very unhelpful for Abadi. But that is a separate problem.

Kirk H. Sowell is a specialist in Arabic-language research and the principal of Utica Risk Services, a Middle East-focused political risk firm which is the publisher of Inside Iraqi Politics (http://www.insideiraqipolitics.com), a biweekly newsletter.

https://www.iraqincontext.com/single-po ... ish-Region

[Anthea]

Freezing Kurdish vote is one more nail in US, Israel coffin: IRGC commander

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – The Kurdistan Regional Government’s decision to propose freezing the referendum results is one more nail in the coffin for US and Israel power in the Middle East, said the deputy head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.

Hossein Salami, the second-in-command of the IRGC, stated at an event on Wednesday in Iran’s Kurdish city of Kermanshah that the United States is no longer a super power.

The American military is now being challenged by smaller nations in the Middle East and North Korea, he said.

“The United States currently plays a minor, weak, and not decisive role in the equations of the region,” Salami was quoted as saying by Iran’s ISNA news agency.

The IRGC’s Quds force reportedly played a key role backing Iraqi forces and the Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi in their takeover of the oil-rich Kirkuk province and other disputed areas last week.

Chief of staff for Iran’s Supreme Leader, Mohamadi Gulpaigani, stated on Tuesday that the fall of Kirkuk was based on instructions from Ayatollah Khamenei that were carried out by the commander of the Quds Force in order to spoil an American-Israeli plan to create an independent Kurdistan in Iraq, dubbing it a second Israel in the Middle East.

Salami, from the Revolutionary Guards, celebrated the expectations that the Kurdish vote, in his view supported by Tel Aviv and Washington, will further undermine the authority of these two countries in the region.

“Today the news about cancelling the referendum of Iraqi Kurdistan is one more nail in the coffin of the United States and the Zionist regime,” Salami said.

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has not canceled the vote that saw nearly 93 percent support for leaving Iraq. It offered, however, to freeze the results, halt military confrontations, and commence open dialogue with Baghdad on the basis of the Iraqi constitution.

Iraq is yet to officially respond to the KRG offer.

While Israel has publicly supported Kurdish aspirations for an independent state, the United States opposed the vote, mainly citing fears that it will distract from the war on ISIS. Kurdish officials have also said that Washington wants the Kurdish population to help Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi win a second term in parliamentary elections next May.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday said Israel had "great sympathy" for Kurdish aspirations and that the world should concern itself with their well-being.

http://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iran/25102017

[Anthea]

US welcomes Kurdistan offer to halt military ops, begin dialogue

The US State Department is supportive of the Kurdistan Regional Government's (KRG) statement on halting military operations, freezing the outcome of the independence referendum, and opening dialogue.

"We welcome Kurdistan Regional Government statement declaring immediate ceasefire & halt to military [operations.] Calm [and] dialogue are steps forward," read a Wednesday tweet from US State Department Spokesperson Heather Nauert.

The position of the State Department comes after the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) released a statement early on Wednesday morning that was a proposal for a way forward.

Arguing against what would be a devastating war between Iraq and the Kurdistan Region, the KRG proposed three things: the cessation of fighting in the Kurdistan Region; freezing the outcome of the independence referendum; and beginning dialogue with the federal government on the basis of the Iraqi constitution.

The central government objected the September 25 vote, especially it being held in the disputed areas.

At the request of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi and Iraq's parliament, Iraqi security forces including those trained by the United States and Iranian-backed Hashd al-Shaabi paramilitary units entered disputed or Kurdistani areas claimed by Baghdad and Erbil last week.

Their taking control of areas administered by the KRG resulted in deadly clashes between the Iraqis and the Peshmerga forces. A number of civilians were also killed and over 160,000 people were displaced.

The United States has maintained it disagreed with the timing of the Kurdistan Region's referendum and offered a last minute proposal to the Kurdish leadership to call off the vote. Kurdistan Region President Masoud Barzani, who led the 'Yes' vote campaign, said they never received a “stronger alternative” to the referendum with the goal of independence.

In its responses to last week’s violence, the US reserved its harshest criticism for Iran.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told Iranian elements of the Iraqi paramilitaries “to go home,” a comment the Hashd al-Shaabi called a “baseless accusation.”

Tillerson met with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi in Riyadh and in Baghdad on Sunday and Monday.

Iraqi PM Abadi: We want to work with Iran and US

Abadi requested the United States not bring its “trouble inside of Iraq” following remarks by Washington that it was concerned about Iranian influences in Iraq.

Abadi spoke to reporters from The Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and the Los Angeles Times on Tuesday.

“We would like to work with you, both of you,” Washington Post reported Abadi as saying of the United States and Iran. “But please don’t bring your trouble inside Iraq. You can sort it anywhere else.”

Kurds have longed for independence since the breakup of the Ottoman Empire in the 20th century left them without a state of their own. The Kurdistan Region's non-binding independence referendum aimed to voice the desires of those living in its four provinces, along with those in oil-rich and diverse disputed or Kurdistani areas claimed by Erbil and Baghdad.

“In all honesty, I think this aspiration has been pushed back many years now,” Abadi said, adding that Kurdish independence would require a nationwide consensus.

Abadi saw the referendum as a unilateral act by the KRG.

"We’ve said it publicly since this call for the referendum in the Kurdistan areas, and we told them we are citizens of one country, you can’t just draw a line and say I’m going to protect it with blood," Abadi said, according to the LA Times. "This is not your right."

The prime minister believes the Iraqi constitution guarantees federal control of places like Kirkuk.

"Disputed areas, under the Iraqi constitution must be under the control of the federal state," he added.

The Kurdistan Region is a key link and land bridge between Iraq, Turkey and beyond to Europe, another flashpoint for relations between Erbil and Baghdad.

“Iraq must have a border with Turkey. They should not cut Iraq from Turkey,” Abadi said, according to the WSJ. “The Kurds are our citizens. My priority is to protect them, to protect the rest of Iraqis, but I’m sending a powerful message: if you continue to kill Iraqi soldiers you will be held responsible.”

Kurds make up around 20 percent of the Iraqi population and complain the Iraqi constitution has not been followed, notably Article 140 which was to settle the disputed areas in 2007 but was never implemented, even when there was a large US troop presence.

When the United States withdrew its combat troops in 2010, Sunni extremists became disenfranchised in the Shiite-majority country under then Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki who leads Abadi's party. ISIS rose in 2013 with the Iraqi army retreating from areas in 2014, including the disputed areas and the country's second-largest city of Mosul.

US Senator McCain: 'I choose the Kurds'

If the United States is forced to choose between Iranian-backed militias and the Kurds in Iraq, US Senator John McCain, the chairman of the Committee on Armed Services, prefers its decades-long US ally.

"Let me be clear..." wrote the six-term US senator in a New York Time opinion-editorial on Wednesday, "I choose the Kurds."

He questioned whether Baghdad can guarantee the Kurdish people, "security, freedom and opportunities they desire."

The Peshmerga have been partners, at times clandestine, of the United States since the 1960s and were key allies in the fight against ISIS, sacrificing around 2,000 soldiers.

"The United States offered arms and training to the government of Iraq to fight the Islamic State [ISIS] and secure Iraq from external threats — not to attack Iraqi Kurds, who are some of America’s most trusted and capable partners in the region," said McCain.

McCain noted reports of Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani near Kirkuk when "preparing military advances on Kurdish positions by Iranian-backed Iraqi militias to augment the broader efforts of Iraqi security forces."

McCain blamed the "unfortunate legacy" Middle East policy that the Barack Obama administration left for Donald Trump.

"This is totally unacceptable," said the senator.

McCain and Trump are both of the Republican party, but have clashed with the latter poking fun at McCain's time as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

The senator from Arizona last visited the Kurdistan Region in late 2014. He applauded Peshmerga forces for their resistance against ISIS. He has since twice visited Kurdish fighters in northern Syria's Rojava.

McCain, 80, was diagnosed with brain cancer this summer. Kurdish leaders, including those in the Kurdistan Regional Government, were fast to wish him a speedy recovery.

The Senate Committee on Armed Forces has legislative oversight on US military spending. Kurdish Peshmerga have benefited from hundreds of millions of dollars in line-item Iraqi Train & Equip Funding.

The National Defense Authorization Act for 2018 has passed both legislative chambers in the US Congress, and differences between the House and Senate versions are being resolved before it is put on Trump's desk.

Kurdish forces are eligible to receive funds, but in the September 18 version they must have "a national security mission" or be "at a base or facility of the Government of Iraq" involved in "activities of the Office of Security Cooperation in Iraq."

http://www.rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/251020176

[Anthea]

This is one of the most heartbreaking stories of all

After Kurdish vote, time to quit media, time to lose faith in humanity
By Osamah Golp

On September 25 I was in the newsroom putting together people’s thoughts about the Kurdish vote on independence when I unexpectedly came across a video footage of my own father speaking to a Rudaw reporter in my hometown of Halabja. My father, who spent seven years in exile, a year in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison, and had lost his lifesavings at least three times due to Iraq’s cyclic conflicts, was saying to the reporter that he would happily vote for independence since this was perhaps his last chance to have a say on Kurdistan’s future before he dies. For many who do not know my father this emotional moment might go unnoticed. I was sad and angry that my dad, a veteran Peshmerga, may not see an independent Kurdish state in his lifetime, but I had no doubt that I would see that day.

Three weeks later, and once again in the newsroom, I was watching Live on television Peshmerga fighters crying and begging their commanders to stay on and fight the Iraqi forces advancing on Kirkuk, our beloved Jerusalem. At that point I truly felt like even I may never see an independent Kurdistan.

Nothing had prepared me for that day, neither my training at one of the world’s best journalism schools in in London, nor the year-long reporting on death and destruction of Mosul, nor the tragic history of my own hometown where thousands had died of betrayal and abandonment.

I watched our dream of independence dash before my own eyes while suppressing my anger so as to report it to the outside world, though I was sure it would be one of the darkest moments in our history. I felt devastated. I stayed at my desk and worked round the clock partly because we were short-staffed and also because I could not sleep anymore. I was afraid of sleeping. I worked more than 40 hours, and when I went home for a few hours of rest, I returned to the office shortly afterwards and covered the news for another 24 hours.

Since October 16, I wake up with a lot of confusion and the feeling of the world having turned upside down. It takes me at least an hour before I decide where the Peshmerga are, where the world stands, and what I am doing. It is a nightmare. It’s like carrying a terrible shame for the rest of your life. All those who died for freedom were let down, not by the Kurds alone, but by humanity.

The scene in Kirkuk brought back to me the memory of those thousands of innocent people who died from the 1988 gas attack, and that of young Mohammed who lost his mind after losing two dozen family members in a day.

This disaster in Kirkuk and other areas raised a serious question in my mind: Did we in the Kurdish media, including me, do all we could to tell the world why millions of people no longer wanted to live with a country that had committed genocide against them.

I am proud of my team at Rudaw English for doing whatever they could to convey the Kurdish perspective in a professional way. We double-checked stories, tried to verify them before posting, and so many times did we kill stories we thought came from unreliable sources.

As for myself, my time log didn’t change that much before and after the referendum. Many days I worked many extra unpaid hours, sometimes even a full second shift. I later used that to comfort myself that we did all we could to tell the story of the referendum, which I personally dubbed the Question of the Century.

At Rudaw English, we are proud to have done our coverage of this historic Kurdish day objectively and tried to convey both the Iraqi and Kurdish perspective. I’m happy that we covered every speech and remark of Iraq’s Prime Minister Abadi, as we did the same for the Kurdish President Barzani.

So whatever went wrong on October 16, I am truly convinced that it was not the fault of the media. It was the fault of the world who despite being fully aware of our dreams and aspirations decided to turn a blind eye, and even worse still, blame the victim, those who dared to dream of freedom.

As President Barzani said, the vote was to choose between freedom and subjugation. But it soon turned out we had to choose between death or subjugation. Death if you voted leave, and subordination if you ignored the vote.

I have to say that I no longer believe in my work as a journalist. I’m convinced that the reports we write, and even this piece, will make no difference. As a veteran journalist once said, if the world cared about humanity, we would have cared about Aleppo. It is all meaningless. The world does not care. And in turn I’ve lost all faith in media and in humanity, too.

Osamah Golpy is desk manager and editor at Rudaw English

http://www.rudaw.net/english/opinion/25102017

[Anthea]

Did we in the Kurdish media, including me, do all we could to tell the world why millions of people no longer wanted to live with a country that had committed genocide against them.

Begs the question: Are we doing all we can to tell the world why millions of people no longer wanted to live with a country that had committed genocide against them?

[Anthea]

KR Security Council Press Release

Iraqi Forces/Iranian-backed PMF have deployed tanks, artillery and US Humvees & APCs in NW Mosul for a major, imminent attack on Peshmerga.

Please click on image to enlarge

[Anthea]

KR Security Council‏Verified account @KRSCPress 3m3 minutes ago

Iraqi forces and Iranian-backed PMF are shelling Peshmerga positions from Zummar, North West of Mosul. Now advancing.

[Piling]

These assholes will harm the dam and drown all Iraq… Or Kurdistan and Iraq will be separated, at last : by a huge lake

[Anthea]

These assholes will harm the dam and drown all Iraq… Or Kurdistan and Iraq will be separated, at last : by a huge lake

Excellent idea