Information and liaison bulletin - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Basin Ozeti
on guerrillas from the Kurdistan Work¬
ers' Party, or PKK, who use the jagged
mountain border frontier as a haven
after attacks in Turkey.
"We have taken the decision to pur¬
sue an operation," Erdogan said Mon¬
day through an interpreter at the Na¬
tional Press Club. "We are not seeking
war," he added, but he offered no specif¬
ics or timing.
His battle is largely one of percep¬
tion, trying to convince the Turkish
public that he is acting against the
Kurdish guerrillas and that he has U.S.
support to do so. But most analysts in
Turkey expect any attack to be limited.
Whatever the case, Erdogan's visit
seemed to satisfy the Turkish public.
"People are probably giving the gov¬
ernment the benefit of the doubt at the
moment," said liter Turan, a political
science professor at Istanbul Bilgi Uni¬
versity. "Most are relieved that no major
operation will start on Iraq."
But if a large attack were to occur,
Turkish soldiers would encounter thou¬
sands of Kurdish pesh merga fighters
who have formed a loose defensive line
that parallels the Turkish border along
the ridges of the Mateen Mountains.
Kurdish leaders speak only generally
about repelling an invasion, but political
and military commanders here have
specific instructions: Attacks on civilian
villages will draw a fierce counterattack.
"If the civilians face any problems,
that is our 100 percent red line,"
Muhammad Muhsen, a regional leader
of the Kurdistan Democratic Party of¬
fice in Amedi, said in a recent inter¬
view, before Kurdish authorities prohib¬
ited local commanders from discussing
the conflict with Turkey. Amedi an¬
chors a large border region where fight¬
ers are camped on south-facing slopes
as trucks bring pesh merga fighters and
weapons up curvy roads.
Muhsen expressed a common fear
among Kurdish commanders, that the
Turkish military wanted to use recent
guerrilla attacks as an excuse to damage
the Kurdish autonomous region in Iraq.
Yet years of fighting the PKK have
made for strange bedfellows, especially
in Bamarni, a village north ofDahuk. In
the mid-1990s the Kurdistan Democrat¬
ic Party, the dominant power in western
Kurdistan, allowed the Turkish mili¬
tary to occupy several bases on the Iraqi
side of the border, when both were
fighting the PKK. The Turks now have
about 1,500 soldiers at these bases, said
a senior American military official in
Baghdad who was not authorized to
speak for the record.
In Bamarni, Kurdish pesh merga
fighters are now stationed at a camp be¬
side a Turkish air base that is home to
dozens of tanks and armored vehicles.
Turkish soldiers routinely dash out in
gun trucks to deliver food to soldiers op¬
erating tanks that oversee the air base.
They also buy supplies at local shops,
said Ahmed Saeed, a local political offi¬
cial at a Kurdish outpost nearby.
"They have no obstacles to going to
the market," said Saeed, who estimated
that as many as 400 Turkish soldiers and
50 tanks were at the base. The pesh
merga never have problems with the sol¬
diers, he said. But if heavy fighting
breaks out he is not sure what to expect.
"If they surrender themselves to us,
then we will not kill them, because we
are peaceful," he said.
Sabrina Tavernise contributed report¬
ingfrom Istanbul, and an Iraqi employee
ofThe New York Times contributedfrom
Iraqi Kurdistan.
car RodioJFrccEurop*
f ftodiotiberty Iraqi Governor Calls Federalism Best Solution
November 6. 2007 I RFBRD-
The governor of the Iraqi province of Al-Najaf says that federalism offers the best solution for Iraq's regions to
reconstruct and succeed economically
PRAGUE - As'ad Sultan Abu Kulal said on a
supporters of al-Sadr and supporters of other
visit to RFE/RL in Prague today that his region
Shi'ite religious parties, particularly the Su¬
is using the decentralization of power in Bagh¬
preme Islamic Iraqi Council. A major modera¬
dad to make many of its own decisions. He says
ting influence over the sometimes violent riva¬
the result it that Al-Najaf has achieved economic
lries between factions is the presence of Grand
self-sufficiency, both in food and fuel.
Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the preeminent Shi'ite-
The Al-Najaf governor acknowledged that his
religious authority in Iraq.
province has many starting advantages - inclu¬
The Al-Najaf governor told RFE/RL's Radio
ding a historically thriving tourism industry b
Free Iraq that federalism offers opportunities for
ased on religious pilgrims flockingto the Shi'ite
other parts of the country, too, despite resistance
holy city of Al-Najaf.
to the idea in some quarters.
The religious tourism has boomed since the
overthrow in 2003 of Saddam Hussein's regime,
which greatly discouraged it. Recent years have
seen investors build more than 450 hotels to
lodge the pilgrims, many of whom are from
neighboring Iran. The trade also supports res¬
taurants and specialty shops, generating enough
revenue for the city to enjoy considerable eco¬
nomic security relative to much of the rest of the
country.
Benefits Of Devolution
But Abu Kulal says Al-Najaf has prospered in
recent years mostly because the decentralized
government in Baghdad allows local authorities
to make many key decisions on their own. He
says the city's goal is to use this freedom to
create self-sufficiency in fuel and food two key
economic staples.
"Our theory as a provincial council and civil
administration is to build complementary, selfsufficient
institutions for this purpose," he said.
"For example, we are building the health sector,
to have hospitals, and have medicine depots.
For energy, we are building power stations, in
order not to need power transferred from other
provinces. We are building oil refineries, so as
not to be obliged to bring fuel from outside the
province."
Al-Najaf has been relatively free of unrest since
major fighting between U.S.-backed Iraqi forces
and members of the Imam Al-Mahdi-Army in
2004. The Al-Mahdi Army is loyal to radical
Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who opposes the
U.S. presence in Iraq.
Control of the city today is shared between
"We have tried during the last few years to
practice a tiny part of decentralization, and you
could see the huge change that happened when
the state gave [us] a little bit of authority, and a
little bit of funds," Abu Kulal said. "Despite the
lack of local resources and human resources
there was development. But the problem that we
face is that a part of the Iraqi people lack a kno¬
wledge of federalism."
Federalism remains a divisive issue in Iraq,
where the Sunni community says it could lead to
unequal sharing of the country's oil wealth or
even break up of the country. Most oil wells are
in the Shi'ite-majority south of the country or in
the Kurdish north.
Iraq's Kurds currently enjoy substantial autono¬
my under Iraq's federal system. Many Shi'ite
parties are actively pressing for similar rights
for southern areas.
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