Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Los Angeles Times
November 2, 2007
Pg. 1
Few want to get involved in Turkey's battle with Kurdish rebels based in Iraq's Kurdistan region. Regional leaders and Secretary Rice take up the matter in Istanbul today.
By Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
ZURKAN, IRAQ — The two Kurdish guards at a checkpoint near the base of northern Iraq's forbidding mountains were assigned to blockade movements by rebel Kurds from Turkey.
They said they'd gladly give their blood to defend their homeland, fight Al Qaeda and even protect American forces.
But both paused when asked Thursday if they would fight the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, guerrillas.
"If the leadership orders it, I guess I would fight them," said Bakhtiar Khedeir, a member of the security force in Iraq's Kurdish semiautonomous region.
But his friend minced no words.
"I wouldn't," said Kaifee Kareem. "They're Kurds."
As U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gathers today with her regional counterparts in Istanbul, Turkey, the guards' views illustrate the intractability of the bloody conflict between the PKK and the Turkish government, and the difficult task ahead for diplomats searching for a peaceful solution.
Iraqi Kurds have been unable or unwilling to fight their own, and many resent what they see as Turkey's continued suppression of the civil rights and cultural identity of Kurds in that country, where they make up about one-fifth of the population.
"The Kurds are not ready at all to fight other Kurds," said Kendal Nezan, president of the Kurdish Institute of Paris, a think tank. "Even if there were orders from the Kurdish leaders, the peshmerga wouldn't do it," he added, referring to Kurdish militia fighters.
Turkey has threatened to invade northern Iraq to root out the rebels if Iraqi or U.S. officials don't act. But U.S. troops in Iraq already are overstretched and remain hard-pressed to maintain security in Baghdad and Diyala province.
Dispatching the Iraqi army to tackle the problem also is politically unfeasible. The last time the army was here, in 1996 under President Saddam Hussein, it opened fire on Iraqi Kurds. In 1991, Hussein's helicopters mowed down fleeing Kurdish refugees.
But without intervention by Iraqi Kurds, Turkey may feel forced to take action, analysts say.
On Thursday, Turkey moved to impose economic sanctions on groups that support the PKK, and Prime Minister Recep Tay- yip Erdogan heads to Washington this weekend for more talks.
The PKK, operating from northern Iraq, has launched cross-border attacks on Turkish forces, killing scores of soldiers and sparking demands in Turkey for tougher action by the Ankara government. Both the U.S. and Turkey regard the PKK as a terrorist organization.
Many observers see the Iraqi Kurds as the main reason for the PKK's resilience. The group's guerrillas have found a haven in the mountainous border region governed by Iraqi Kurds, who have been unable or unwilling to quash the separatist group.
Turkey's turbulent domestic politics, with Erdogan's Islamist-rooted government pitted against a secular opposition eager to depict him as flawed, have inflamed Ankara's long-standing concerns about the regional ambitions of Kurdish leaders in northern Iraq.
But Iraqi Kurdistan officials point out that Turkey has tried for more than two decades to stamp out the PKK without success. Iraqi Kurds have previously joined forces with Turkey against the group, without being able to deliver more than a momentary blow.
They say Turkey must reach a political compromise with the PKK, starting by granting the nation's Kurdish minority more cultural and political rights.
"The reason for this conflict is the Turkish government, which doesn't want to solve the Kurdish issue in Turkey by peaceful and democratic means," said Zerak Kamal, an Iraqi Kurdish politician.
Kurds, mostly inhabiting a mountainous and watery region that stretches across southern Turkey and northern Iraq, Iran and Syria, have struggled for decades for national recognition and civil rights against their stronger Arab, Persian and Turkish neighbors. Iraq's three-province Kurdistan regional government, with its own parliament, ministries and foreign policy, is the first sustained self-rule Kurds have enjoyed in centuries.
Militarily, the PKK is a notoriously difficult target. Its ranks include seasoned fighters, men and women, who move in groups of no more than 15, ferrying assault rifles and rocket launchers in and out of hidden caves and snow-covered crevices in mountains towering two miles high.
"In places not even a goat can pass, the PKK can pass," said Khedeir, the border guard.
But Iraqi Kurds acknowledge they could do more to hurt the PKK's supply lines, reduce their mobility and single them out for arrest. Kurdish villagers say the PKK militants, easily identified by their Turkish accents, often visit towns to buy food and gear.
In the run-up to the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, Iraqi Kurdish forces took up arms against fellow Kurds when they shelled positions of Ansar al Islam, an extremist Muslim group with ties to Al Qaeda that is holed up in the equally treacherous mountains on the border with Iran. In March 2003, thousands of Kurdish fighters overran Ansar positions in a sweeping ground campaign after U.S. forces struck their bases with Tomahawk cruise missiles.
But officials say Ansar, even though it recruited mostly Kurds, pursued an ideology with little popular support here: the establishment of an Islamic caliphate.
To many, Turkish Kurds are fighting only for what the Iraqi Kurds have already attained in northern Iraq, autonomy. "The PKK has a wide public base and makes a good case, and also has strong financial capabilities," said Sherko Abdallah, an Iraqi Kurdish lawmaker.
Even those Kurdish villagers here most affected by the fighting and shelling, including barrages of Iranian rockets that have displaced scores of families in the middle of this year's harvest, say they feel sympathy for the PKK.
"As long as they have been here they have been nothing but trouble," said Musa Ibrahim, a broad-shouldered farmer in his 30s.
"Otherwise their concerns are valid. To be honest, we believe in their cause."
The allegiance of the Kurdish people, both culturally and politically, makes it even more difficult for Kurdish leaders to oppose their rebel brethren to the north.
For decades Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned leader of the PKK, was a bitter rival of Massoud Barzani, the president of Iraq's Kurdistan regional government and scion of a Kurdish nationalist family.
Both men have ambitions of leading the region's 25 million to 40 million Kurds, believed to be the largest ethnic group without a country.
"Barzani will only damage himself politically to take action against the PKK at this time," said a former U.S. diplomat based in the Middle East for 30 years, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "Perhaps not so much inside Iraq, but in terms of his broader objective, to become the Kurdistan-wide Kurdish el Supremo."
Iraqi Kurds say they have worked hard to convince Turkey and Iran that they harbor no wider regional ambitions and pose no threat, even enticing them to share in northern Iraq's growing financial riches.
But turning their guns on the PKK is one compromise they say they're unwilling to make.
"The PKK doesn't threaten the security of the [Kurdistan] region," said Jabbar Yawir, a spokesman for the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs, which handles social and other services to former Kurdish warriors who fought against Hussein.
"This struggle is none of our business."
Times staff writer Laura King in Istanbul, Turkey, and special correspondent Asso Ahmed in Sulaymaniya, Iraq, contributed to this report.
November 2, 2007
Pg. 1
Few want to get involved in Turkey's battle with Kurdish rebels based in Iraq's Kurdistan region. Regional leaders and Secretary Rice take up the matter in Istanbul today.
By Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
ZURKAN, IRAQ — The two Kurdish guards at a checkpoint near the base of northern Iraq's forbidding mountains were assigned to blockade movements by rebel Kurds from Turkey.
They said they'd gladly give their blood to defend their homeland, fight Al Qaeda and even protect American forces.
But both paused when asked Thursday if they would fight the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, guerrillas.
"If the leadership orders it, I guess I would fight them," said Bakhtiar Khedeir, a member of the security force in Iraq's Kurdish semiautonomous region.
But his friend minced no words.
"I wouldn't," said Kaifee Kareem. "They're Kurds."
As U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gathers today with her regional counterparts in Istanbul, Turkey, the guards' views illustrate the intractability of the bloody conflict between the PKK and the Turkish government, and the difficult task ahead for diplomats searching for a peaceful solution.
Iraqi Kurds have been unable or unwilling to fight their own, and many resent what they see as Turkey's continued suppression of the civil rights and cultural identity of Kurds in that country, where they make up about one-fifth of the population.
"The Kurds are not ready at all to fight other Kurds," said Kendal Nezan, president of the Kurdish Institute of Paris, a think tank. "Even if there were orders from the Kurdish leaders, the peshmerga wouldn't do it," he added, referring to Kurdish militia fighters.
Turkey has threatened to invade northern Iraq to root out the rebels if Iraqi or U.S. officials don't act. But U.S. troops in Iraq already are overstretched and remain hard-pressed to maintain security in Baghdad and Diyala province.
Dispatching the Iraqi army to tackle the problem also is politically unfeasible. The last time the army was here, in 1996 under President Saddam Hussein, it opened fire on Iraqi Kurds. In 1991, Hussein's helicopters mowed down fleeing Kurdish refugees.
But without intervention by Iraqi Kurds, Turkey may feel forced to take action, analysts say.
On Thursday, Turkey moved to impose economic sanctions on groups that support the PKK, and Prime Minister Recep Tay- yip Erdogan heads to Washington this weekend for more talks.
The PKK, operating from northern Iraq, has launched cross-border attacks on Turkish forces, killing scores of soldiers and sparking demands in Turkey for tougher action by the Ankara government. Both the U.S. and Turkey regard the PKK as a terrorist organization.
Many observers see the Iraqi Kurds as the main reason for the PKK's resilience. The group's guerrillas have found a haven in the mountainous border region governed by Iraqi Kurds, who have been unable or unwilling to quash the separatist group.
Turkey's turbulent domestic politics, with Erdogan's Islamist-rooted government pitted against a secular opposition eager to depict him as flawed, have inflamed Ankara's long-standing concerns about the regional ambitions of Kurdish leaders in northern Iraq.
But Iraqi Kurdistan officials point out that Turkey has tried for more than two decades to stamp out the PKK without success. Iraqi Kurds have previously joined forces with Turkey against the group, without being able to deliver more than a momentary blow.
They say Turkey must reach a political compromise with the PKK, starting by granting the nation's Kurdish minority more cultural and political rights.
"The reason for this conflict is the Turkish government, which doesn't want to solve the Kurdish issue in Turkey by peaceful and democratic means," said Zerak Kamal, an Iraqi Kurdish politician.
Kurds, mostly inhabiting a mountainous and watery region that stretches across southern Turkey and northern Iraq, Iran and Syria, have struggled for decades for national recognition and civil rights against their stronger Arab, Persian and Turkish neighbors. Iraq's three-province Kurdistan regional government, with its own parliament, ministries and foreign policy, is the first sustained self-rule Kurds have enjoyed in centuries.
Militarily, the PKK is a notoriously difficult target. Its ranks include seasoned fighters, men and women, who move in groups of no more than 15, ferrying assault rifles and rocket launchers in and out of hidden caves and snow-covered crevices in mountains towering two miles high.
"In places not even a goat can pass, the PKK can pass," said Khedeir, the border guard.
But Iraqi Kurds acknowledge they could do more to hurt the PKK's supply lines, reduce their mobility and single them out for arrest. Kurdish villagers say the PKK militants, easily identified by their Turkish accents, often visit towns to buy food and gear.
In the run-up to the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, Iraqi Kurdish forces took up arms against fellow Kurds when they shelled positions of Ansar al Islam, an extremist Muslim group with ties to Al Qaeda that is holed up in the equally treacherous mountains on the border with Iran. In March 2003, thousands of Kurdish fighters overran Ansar positions in a sweeping ground campaign after U.S. forces struck their bases with Tomahawk cruise missiles.
But officials say Ansar, even though it recruited mostly Kurds, pursued an ideology with little popular support here: the establishment of an Islamic caliphate.
To many, Turkish Kurds are fighting only for what the Iraqi Kurds have already attained in northern Iraq, autonomy. "The PKK has a wide public base and makes a good case, and also has strong financial capabilities," said Sherko Abdallah, an Iraqi Kurdish lawmaker.
Even those Kurdish villagers here most affected by the fighting and shelling, including barrages of Iranian rockets that have displaced scores of families in the middle of this year's harvest, say they feel sympathy for the PKK.
"As long as they have been here they have been nothing but trouble," said Musa Ibrahim, a broad-shouldered farmer in his 30s.
"Otherwise their concerns are valid. To be honest, we believe in their cause."
The allegiance of the Kurdish people, both culturally and politically, makes it even more difficult for Kurdish leaders to oppose their rebel brethren to the north.
For decades Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned leader of the PKK, was a bitter rival of Massoud Barzani, the president of Iraq's Kurdistan regional government and scion of a Kurdish nationalist family.
Both men have ambitions of leading the region's 25 million to 40 million Kurds, believed to be the largest ethnic group without a country.
"Barzani will only damage himself politically to take action against the PKK at this time," said a former U.S. diplomat based in the Middle East for 30 years, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "Perhaps not so much inside Iraq, but in terms of his broader objective, to become the Kurdistan-wide Kurdish el Supremo."
Iraqi Kurds say they have worked hard to convince Turkey and Iran that they harbor no wider regional ambitions and pose no threat, even enticing them to share in northern Iraq's growing financial riches.
But turning their guns on the PKK is one compromise they say they're unwilling to make.
"The PKK doesn't threaten the security of the [Kurdistan] region," said Jabbar Yawir, a spokesman for the Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs, which handles social and other services to former Kurdish warriors who fought against Hussein.
"This struggle is none of our business."
Times staff writer Laura King in Istanbul, Turkey, and special correspondent Asso Ahmed in Sulaymaniya, Iraq, contributed to this report.
