15 MINUTES OUTSIDE OF KIRKUK, Iraq -- The highway to Kirkuk is packed with thousands of civilian vehicles at mid-afternoon today, after news broke that peshmerga had entered this oil-rich city that Kurds have claimed as their own, despite the Turkomen, Arab and Assyrian residents.
The mood is World Cup crazy as people were hanging off trucks and speeding to the city. Armed men stood up in the back of pickup trucks waving the yellow or green flags of the KDP or the PUK, respectively. As we passed, they waved to me and honked, chanting, "America!" On the horizon, however, four thick, black plumes rise up. The faint smell of burning oil was in the air.
I met a B2I reader earlier, djoy, who now says I can use his real name: Delshad Fattah, 33, a former resident of Kirkuk. He came with me to Mosul and was now on the way to Kirkuk with me and Freydoon. I don't think he expected this when he agreed to meet me for tea at 10 a.m.
He said many of the people on the road were going to Kirkuk to loot, and shook his head in sadness. "This is what Saddam has done to my people. He has turned us all into thieves."
We hear news that there is an intifada in Kirkuk. Delshad is a little worried about the conflicts among the different groups now and wonders if we need a weapon.
Along the way, we stop at one of Saddam's old prisons on the road. A peshmerga tells us, when we ask if the road ahead is safe, that we should go ask his commanding officer based in the prison.
Of course there's no such officer but there are about 300 Iraqi soldiers there who have surrendered. They are happy to see me and the two peshmerga guards let me interview them.
They surrendered this morning around 9 a.m., said Motaz, 23. "We know that everything is over, so why fight?" he says. "The leadership is gone, so there is no need." He's a conscript and, like his buddies, glad to be done with the war. This group will be sent to Arbil for processing and then, the guards say, they will be sent home.
The Iraqis say they have been treated well, given good food, cigarettes and tea. They show no signs of mistreatment and even have a jocular relationship with the two guards. These guys have no fight left, if they had any to begin with.
One Iraqi prisoner, Hamid Abdulahussein Karin, tells me he has two brothers in the United States who fled after the first Gulf War. He knows nothing about them and asks me to publish his name in the hope that someone will be able to able. I promise him I will.
"They are too young for this," said Delshad. "They have seen nothing good in this life."
We're close to Kirkuk now, and the smoke is heavy on the horizon. I think it's a refinery, but I don't know. It could be fires in the city. We're going in, as the way seems safe.
“The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders….
All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce
the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger.
It works the same in any country.”
Hermann Goering
I am a little thick. What is your point?
Mr. Zimnoch: Excellent point. Good to see somebody’s thought processes are still processing.
I think I missed something, what is a B2I reader?
chris - this is great reporting! thanks ./bc
ps - tony, r u implying we r being manipulated by chris and that he’s part of our govt leaders?
pps - von, B2I is ‘back to iraq’, this site. :-)
sigh I am so thick at times… Thanks Betty!
Excellent. Can you get more information about this guys brothers? What about a picture of him? I would help in the search but need more information.
The B2i reader is a man who emailed Christopher in either February or early March. The subject of his emails was concerning the conditions in Iraqi Kurdistan. He asked Christopher to use an alias. These emails were posted on the site. They make for interesting reading.
http://www.back-to-iraq.com/archives/000327.php is where you can read one of them.
Dear Chris,
Your reports make it seem as if northern Iraq is only populated by the Kurds, with no mention of Turkmens, Assyrians, Keldanis, and Yezidis. The Turkmens’ situation is especially worrisome, since they are mostly townsfolk, they could not resort to armed brigandage like the Kurds, and they are now under the threat of “ethnic cleansing” by the Kurds. The Turkmens were in the majority of population in Kerkuk, as recently as 1960s, but have been subjected to all kinds of oppression ever since.
If you try to look into the Turkmen perspective, I am sure, your reports will be much more “fair and balanced.”
Khaidar Zaim-oghlu
Mr. Christopher, You are doing a good job! Thank you for reports!
Khaidar Zaim-oghlu
You are surely a Turk. A true Kemalist! Stop spreading lies!
1) KURDS are the majority in Kerkuk
2) KURDS have suffered MUCH more than the Turkmen
3) Turkmen DO have a ARMED FORCE in several hundrad
4) Turkmen has every right as any KURD
5) Turcoman do have Turkish schools, partiers, organizations. They are not in any why oppressed by the Kurds.
6) There are a total of 400 000 Turkmen in the whole of Iraq. Kurds are almost 5 million. Still enjoy every minority right, there is NO discrimination in south Kurdistan.
7) Turkmen are our brothers, we have no issue of hatred or mistreat among us.
8) Both Talabani and Barzani has ALWAYS talked about the Turkmen and Assyrians as brothers and they will be treated as any Kurds.
9) NO way in Middle East there are so many International Organizations such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, UN, Red Cross, you name it. NO way that Kurds will opress with out thier knowglde.
There are NO ethnic problems between Kurds and Turkmen, Turkmen are integrated in society. And mixed with Kurds. My best friend is and he is a high official in Iraqi Turkmen Front in south Kurdistan. My brother in-law is a Turkmen. He thinks Turks should stop spreading lies about our relationships and let Turkmen enjoy their life.
I hope Turkey treats the Kurds in north Kurdistan in the same manner we treat the Turkmen in our province.
Such a hypocrisy , a true Turkish goverment hypocrisy
STOP SPREADING LIES MAN, Shame on you.
I heard read this from the AP wire just a few minutes ago. Evidently, the Minister of Iraqi Defense called all four of Saddam’s body doubles into his bunker and told them, “I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is that Saddam has survived the latest bombing, Praise be Allah…..The bad news is, he lost an arm.”
Keep up the great reports, Chris! These latest ones have been terrific.
Jasper
I am surely a Turk, but no Kemalist! It must be a strange fixation to consider every Turk a Kemalist. And I am trying to disseminate facts.
Thanks to so many years of oppression by both the Baath regime and the Kurds. Check the 1959 census of Iraq, which shows Turkmens in the majority.
I say that Turkmen have suffered, and you counter with this statement, which DOES NOT falsify my statement. As to who suffered MOST, I wonder with which reliable gauge you measured the suffering.
Turkmen are not like Kurds. They don’t have an armed force that can be more appropriately described as “gangs.” Do not get me started on the blood feud between KDP and PKU.
Then, why do you deny them those rights?
I will just remind the Altinoluk massacres in 1996.
That’s curious, because the 1959 official Iraqi figures recorded the total number of Turkmens in Iraq as 567,000 (even that was a low figure). Assuming a growth rate paralleling that of Iraq in general, Turkmen population must have reached 1,7 million in 1994. If you say that there are 400 000 Turkmen now, then, either the difference has been massacred/driven away, or you are not telling the truth.
So are the Kurds, who are our brothers.
No need to treat them as Kurds. Treat them as Turkmens, and citizens of free Iraq. That’s enough!
Turkmens have been oppressed and subjected to “ethnic cleansing” many times. These are well documented.
My sister-in-law’s husband is a Kurd, and I don’t want to write here what he thinks about the peshmerga under KDP and PKU. The Turkmen are urging Turkey to take action. Check your facts:
http://www.turkmencephesi.org
Jasper - LOL. That IS funny man.
Peshmergadotnet - Hey, I clicked on over to your site but see that it’s not up yet, just the “coming soon” page. When, my friend?
Christopher - I gotta tell you that this is some damned good reporting. All four posts from April 10th are dynamite man. The timing of your insertion into northern Iraq is impeccable. Keep those reports coming. We are hungry for them.
One more thing, the name Christopher Allbritton exemplifies the possibilities of the blogosphere more so than the name Sean-Paul Kelly. Any day! I think I’ll head over to the Agonist now and make sure I don’t recognize anything there from here.
Thanks Christopher,
Robert - East Village, NYC
Khaidar Zaimoghlu why don’t you ask your self what the HELL Turkmen are doing in Kurdistan?
Do you even know? They wore soilders under the Ottoman Empire to Gurd and masscure Kurds. Many left when the Empire fall, and those who was left wore Turkmen.
Don’t you talk about Genocide! Your poeple have a great record of genocide, Armenias, Assyrians, Yazids, Arabs, Greeks PLEASE check your facts and stop looking for answers from your facist goverment and racist media.
PUK AND KDP are fare more human to minorites than Turkey it is to it’s people.
Turkmen DID not suffer under Saddams rule, due to the fact many of them wore Baa’th members. And also it was the Kurds who stand aginst Iraq, thats we suffered.
Then Anfal Genocide of 180 - 200 000, it was the Kurds who were killed NOT Turkmen.
Let me tell you something “brother”, we Kurds will never ever EVER give up our dream of Kurdistan. I don’t care about politics and political parites. Turks can never demorlize our struggle, we shall expose your goverment for its crimes.
DO YOU WANT FACTS ABOUT THE TURKMEN in Kurdistan?
http://www.kurdistan.ws/kurdistan8.html
http://www.krg.org/docs/KT020511_full.asp
Your people put people in jail becuase they name thier children in Kurdish
http://anotherkurd.portal.dk3.com/article.php?sid=46
Your police and militry rape women:
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/941996369?ts=1050043853
Women are raped infront of thier husbend
http://www.amnestyusa.org/turkey/women.html
http://www.amnestyusa.org/news/2003/turkey02262003_2.html
PLEASE READ ABOUT THE TRUTH ABOUT YOUR GOV.
http://www.ozgurluk.org/english.pdf (PDF file)
IMAGES OF TURKISH POLICE VIOLENCE
http://www.ozgurluk.org/kurtulus/images/
HERE ARE SOME LINKS:
http://www.ozgurluk.org/press/
THE KURDISH HUMAN RIGHTS PROJECT
http://www.khrp.org
And FINALY A GREAT REVIEW OF TURKEY
http://www.agamemnon.dabsol.co.uk/Cyprus.htm
KURDISTAN-CYPER-ARMENIA-YAZIDI
Viva Kurdistan - Yan Kurdistan Yan Naman - Kerkuk dile Kurdistan
They have been living there for more than thousand years.
During the Lausanne Peace Conference in 1923, Lord Curzon, the British delegate said:
“The Turkmen are populating particularly the cities of Erbil, Altun Kopri, Kerkuk and Kifri. They cannot be considered as an Ottomans Turks. They are the generations of the Turkic tribes, who established in Iraq before the Ottomans and the Seljuk’s.”
I know, because I am a historian. In fact, Turkmen tribes had been living in the region for centuries well before the conception of the Ottoman Empire.
There are countless 19th and early 20th century travelogues, newspaper reports, historical studies, etc, by the Europeans, all testifying that Kerkuk is a predominantly Turkmen city.
Even Lord Curzon, who was an awoved enemy of the Turks, had to admit the historical existence of the Turkmen in the area, centuries before the Ottomans.
Even now, the Kurds are denying the existence of the Turkmen in Iraq, downplaying their population. In the official 1957 census of Iraq, the Turkmen made up 9 percent of the whole Iraq’s population, while the Kurds made up 13 percent. Now, the Kurds are claiming that they outnumber the Turkmen by a ratio of 10 to 1. The Turkmen population was more than 500,000 40 years ago. By any standard, it must be more than 1,5 million today. No one knows the exact numbers, because of the great suffering and oppression of the Turkmen.
The Kurds are even desecrating the Turkmen cemetaries:
http://www.turkmencephesi.org/turkmen_mezarlari.htm
In 1932, the prime minister of the newly independent Iraq, Nuri Al-Said, stated that:
“The official language in the district Kifri of the Kerkuk governorate and central district Kerkuk, which are populated with Turkmen majority, should be in Turkmen in addition to the official country language Arabic”
(http://members.lycos.nl/Kerkuk/KT.html)
This notification was given to members of the League of the Nations in 30 May 1932.
If you don’t know about this document, then go find it in the PRO, or any other archive. If you don’t know what PRO is, let me tell you: It is the British archives, and it stands for “Public Record Office.” You need to look under the reference number “127 Middle East.”
peshmergadotnet, you say:
“Do you even know? They wore soilders under the Ottoman Empire to Gurd and masscure Kurds”
Then, read this passage from the article by Denise Natali, “Kurdayati in the Late Ottoman and Qajar Empires,” that appeared in the academic journal Critique: Critical Middle Eastern Studies, Fall 2002, pp. 177-199. The passage is on page 180:
“Abdulhamid created the Kurdish Ottoman cavalry, or Hamidiyan forces, comprised of Sunni Kurdish tribal groups. The Ottoman elite supported tribal schools in Istanbul and Baghdad, housed Kurdish chfes in exile and bestowed non-tribal Kurds with honors and proviliges. They treated the Kurdish brigand Moussa Bey as royalty when he arrived in Constantinople after massacring Christian groups in the Kurdish regions. Abdulhamid gave the descendants of Kurdish notables …. high posts in the Ottoman administration…. Said Pasha, an Ottoman Prime minister, ambassador to Berlin, and Minister of Foreign Afairs was a Sunni Kurd.”
You see, not only the Turkmen, BUT ALSO THE KURDS served the Ottoman Empire as soldiers. Maybe they (Kurds in the Hamidiyan forces) were the ones massacring their own kin?
I denounce all massacres, carried out by anyone, including the Turks, Kurds, Americans, and the Arabs. I sincerely pray that no “ethnic cleansing” of the Turkmen happens in the following days. The Kurds and the Americans will be held responsible for any crime against the Turkmen.
hey Khaidar Zaimoghlu:
stop bulling around about this Turkmen in iraqi kurdistan .. , the freedom that the Turkmen in Kurdistan have, you can not find it anywhere else in the World ..Turkmen have all kinda rights they want , in iraqi Kurdistan … can Kurds in Turkey have ever such a freem even for ONE day???????
اه تتتتتتتتتتتفهععتتتتتتتتتت
the most important thing is : history is not clear in this area but it is not hard to solve the problems. Historically, kurdish area descended for centuries but for the last year or perhaps 200 years cause of petrol. for kurds are majority in the north, many people deny kurds. My opinion is: Kurds, Turkomen and few Arap and others should established a state smiliar to swiss. Every one should admit that Arabs shuld return cause of Arabisation and Inhabitants should know self-determanition is too much influenced by other countries for unjust gain. HyPOcrassy
بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم والصلات والسلام على سيد المرسلين محمد الامين ام بعد اريد ان اعلق على مادار من حوار بين زايم اوغلو والبيشمهركه . نت انتم يا اعضاء البشمه ركة فعلتم كل ماهو بالامكان لكي يكرهكم شعب العراق من اقصاه الى ادناه ماذا تعتقدون هل تعتقدون ان الناس في العراق ليس لديهم ذاكرة ؟ وانتم تذكرون محاسنكم وهي قليلة جدا والفضل لبعض مسلميكم اعلموا نحن اهل كركوك ونرفضكم ونعتبركم خونة للعراق والاسباب كالاتي 1 انتم تقولون كركوك كردية وهي اكذوبة يعرفها الكل لانكم لاتريدون كركوك بل تريدون ماتحت كركوك من نفط الذي بدونه لاتقوم لكم قائمة 2 انتم تريدون تقسيم العراق ليس حبا لكردستان بل تنفيذا لشروط الحلف الاسائيلي الكردي الاستراتيجي الذي وقعتموه 3 نحن اهل العراق اعلم الناس بنفوسكم وعددكم الذي هو بالواقع اقل من التركمان ولايغرنكم انكم دمجتم المسيحيين في الشمال الى عددكم وحسبتم مدينة اربيل كردية منذ متى واربيل كردية ؟؟؟ انا اقول لك منذ ان اعطاكم صدام الملعون الحكم الذاتي حيث كان من العيب سابقا ان تتكلم بالكردية في اربيل فناهيك كركوك التي هي منبع التركمان 4هل تعلمون ان اهل كركوك الان يكرهونكم جدا من كردهم وعربهم فما بالك باهلها التركمان انتم يا اهالي السليمانية وجمجمال وقوش تبة وشوان وغيرها من القرى المحيطة فعلتم كل ماهو مخزي ومشين سرقتم اموال البنوك وسرقتم كل مايمكن سرقته وبعتوه الى ابناء عمومتكم من السراق في ايران وتركيا فهنيئا لكم هذا النسب 5 انتم تقولون ان صدام فعل بكم كذا وكذا وهي كلها اكاذيب لانه لم يخدم الاكراد مثل صدام ابدا الم يعطكم حكما ذاتيا وهي سابقة دولية الم يعفكم ويحرركم من الخدمة العسكرية الم يعطكم حق التهريب وسلب ونهب العراق الم يجعل منكم الوزراء الم يعطكم حق التملك في بغداد دون العراقيين اجمعهم اوبعد كل هذا اعتبرتوه مجرما وهو لم يقتل منكم بقدر ما قتلتوه انتم نفسكم ال 45000 في حربكم الخرقلء بين الحزبين الكرديين 6 الم يستعن مسعود البارزاني بصدام لقتل الاكراد بحجة انهم من جماعة جلال 7 الحمد لله ان الله اسقط اقنعتكم بعد ماحدث في الفلوجة واثبتم انكم الخونة الرئيسيين في العراق شعبا وارضا بل ووصلت بكم الجرئة ان تصفوا اهل الفلوجة بالارهابيين الخزي والعار لكم في الدنيا والاخرة 8 اعلمو ان اهل العراق عازمون على التخلص منكم الى الابد ولا ينفعكم ان تتذللو للامريكان او ان تقدموا نسائكم لهم وهذه حقيقة لاتستطيع نفيها وان كنت لاتصدق فعليك بزيارة الامريكان في كركوك في القاعدة ورؤيتهم وهن في احضان الامريكان بل ويتفاخرن بذلك 9 ان فيكم بعضا من الشرفاء متمثلين بجماعة الملا كريكار عسى الله ان يهديكم الى سواء السبيل 10 يا اكراد العراق ارجعوا الى دينكم وابتعدوا عن الشيطان ان الحياة قصيرة فماذا تقولون لربكم ان متتوا انني كردي بل سيسألكم عن عملكم 11 العراق سيبقى الى الابد ارض الاسلام وارض الصالحين ولا يصح الى الصحيح -وسترى الكافرين اي منقلب سينقلبون - صدق الله العظيــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــــم 24 \4 \2004
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Trkiye Irak Devleti’nin, kukla bir Krdistan kurulmak yoluyla, yeni bir İsrail yapılmasına msaade etmeyecektir.
I hope Turkey won’t let U.S.A., England and Israel found a new Israel under name of Kurdistan.
hello my brother is in kirkuk his name is paul reese. i just hope they get home safe. and we are all puling for them