.Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Basm Özeti
Tbe pre-Hussein currency known as Swiss print
represents Iraqi Kurds' y~arning for auton~my.
Its value is rising with belief that Hussein will fall.
War could put at risk the freedoms they have now.
Their biggest concern: Domination by Thrkey.
SULAYMANIYAH, Iraq
- In war zones, there
always seems to be a
certain hotel where the
foreign pressgathers.
. In the run-up to. the Gulf
.War, the Iraqis corralled the
media into the Al Rasheed Hotel
in Baghdad, where the sbabby
rooms were bugged with spy
cameras. A portrait of George
Bush served as a doormat, and
every foreign visitor was shadowed
by a "minder."
In northern Iraq, the Sulaimani
Palace is the favored
place for journalists to wait out
the weeks before a U.S. invasion.
Unlike the Al Rasheed,
. however, the Palace is run by
people who hope the United
States wins the war.
But northern Iraq is a region
on edge. You can feel it in~the
hotel, in the streets. PelJple
here want Saddam Hussein
gone;,but they remember past
betrayals by America, and they
fear what the future will bring ..
•
Of the seven floors of the Sulaimani
Palace, the sixth is taken
over by NBC-TV and the
ftfth untilreeently was home to
the Iraqi National Congress, an
opposition group whose leader,
Ahmad Chalabi, regularly
swept through the lobby with a
,.éöntingent of bodyguards. The
.deep chairs in the lobby are
filled with local drivers and
bodyguards who work for !he
droves of American, European
and Japapese journalists who
drive around in rented SUVs
and pickups. the journalists
carry Thoraya satellite phones
no bigger than a cell phone, far
different from the Gulf War,'
when satphones were so large they
had to be mounted on vans.
Sulaymaniyah .is located in Iraqi
Kurdistan, a region whose population
enjoys a de facto autonomy from Saddam
Hussein's dictatorship: It is protected
by a no-fly zone policed by U.S.
and British warplanes. The Palace
was built two years ago, probably
with hopès that this gorgeous region,
ringed by spectacular snow-topped .
peaks and pierced by emerald-green
valleys, could become a tourist mecca,
someday.
The region is run by one of two
large Kurdish political parties, the Patriotic
Union of Kurdistan, whose.
. prime minister, Barham Salib, has a
British doctorate and is trying to link
his people ~th the. globalized world.
Trudy Rubin Worldview . . .. .. .
For Iraqi Kurds, a fear of tomorrow
So even though the regufar phones
barely work, and you can't get mail
delivered, and the Sulaimani Palace
has no fax m.'tîmw: .n.~~r;' every co,"
ner has a store selling the latest model
of cell phones. The Kurds ,are a
mountain people who excel in smuggling,
and all manner of electronic
goods make their way into Kurdistan
from Arab Gulf states.
Just about every corner in Sulaymaniyah
also has an Internet cafe full
of young Kurds chatting with one another
or their relatives in the United
States, or logging onto foreign news
sites. Most people here are better informed
about the world than the typical
American; you can see satellite
dishes mounted on the rudest homes
made of stone or concrete, with moss
roofs held down by large rocks.
Though mountain roads in Kurdistan
.are cracked and rutted, and the region
is far from just about anywhere,
Iraqi Kurds know what the world is
saying about the coming war.
•
The Kurds are a Muslim, non-Arab,
ethnic group who hoped for independence
after the breakup of the Ottoman
Empire. Instead, their territory
was divided among. four countries:
Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria. Turkey
waged a long civil war to suppress
Kurdish dreams of independence. and
Iraqi Kurds have often battled Baghdad
rulers, including Hussein .
Reminders of such battles are everywhet'e.
In the center of Sulaymaniyah .
: sits a gutted prison, four floors of yel- .
low b~ick, pockmarked with bullet
. holes, with empty windows gaping,
where Hussein's secret police once
tortured Kurds -and raped their women.
The buildings seem haunted, especially
at twilight, with black ,clouds
hovering, when one can walk through
cells being turned into a museum. In
several rooms, hooks are still jutting
from the ceiling,hooks from which
Kurds were hung with hands tied behind
their backs. In a hallway, a plaster
statue of a man, one hand manaclec;lto
the wall, back facingoutward,
.stands as a reminder of the guards'
practice of beating the prisoner on
the back each time they walked by.
Graffiti still line the célls, including .