Iraqi City Fractures Along Ethnic Lines

The Washington Post ^ | January 24, 2004 | Daniel Williams

[neverdem]

In Kirkuk, Hussein's Fall Released Old Rivalries Among Kurds, Arabs and Turkmens

KIRKUK, Iraq -- This ethnically mixed city sitting atop vast oil resources has become dangerously polarized, with Kurds and Arabs vying to dominate it in the new Iraq.

Talk of ethnic brotherhood has ended, replaced by heated, exclusionist rhetoric and violence. Kurdish gunfire killed at least two demonstrators at a New Year's Eve march by Arabs and Turkmens -- Kirkuk's third major ethnic group -- against a measure of autonomy for Kurds. Within a week, unknown gunmen killed three Kurds.

Over at the Turkmen Culture Center and Billiards Hall in a Turkmen part of town, young men complained that Kurdish teachers had supplanted Arabs and Turkmens and were scheduling exams so that the students could not participate in political demonstrations. The students said they felt intimidated.

"We are getting afraid to speak out," said Anes Sabah Mohammed, a student at Kirkuk Technical Academy, a mixed vocational school. On Jan. 8, someone detonated a bomb in front of the school. It shattered windows but injured no one. "Anyone could have put it there," he said. "Everyone could be a target of someone in Kirkuk."

[neverdem]

I think what happens in Kirkuk will foretell whether Iraq survives as a nation.

[optimistically_conservative]

ping

[M Kehoe]

Imho, there is a high probability that when the bulk of Coalition forces leave, there will be civil war. I hope I'm wrong.

5.56mm

[ccmay]

The Arabs in Kirkuk and Mosul are Baathist interlopers, imported by Saddam to supplant the native Kurdish population. The Kurds should deal with them as they deserve. Let them leave, or die.

-ccm

[SubMareener]

All the reports I have seen say that the reversal of Saddam's force migrations is going as well as can be expected. Things are mostly being handled by courts. People are returning to their original homes. Life goes on.

[yankeedame]

Imho, there is a high probability that when the bulk of Coalition forces leave, there will be civil war.

Neighbor, you can take that to the bank! The British Raj was in India approx. 300 years. Before, during, and after, the British withdrawal is conservatively est. that 12+m Indians died in the blood baths among natives.

Alas, I see nothing in history to suggest that our occupation/liberation/withdrawal from Iraq will be any different than that of the British Raj -- no matter how long we stay.