THE WALL IS THEIR GRAVE

Statement by The BRussells Tribunal Committee
(25 April 2007)
[Endorsers]
http://brusselstribunal.org/


Plans for Al-Adhamiyah confirm that the US occupation and its puppets in Iraq can build nothing but open-air prisons. It will fail.
No military strategy can impose on the Iraqi people an occupation it overwhelmingly refuses. Its resistance is national and continues.
What kind of government walls-in its own people? One desperate and illegitimate, tied to the fate of a defeated occupation.

The latest US ploy to subjugate Baghdad — exemplified in plans to wall-in the district of Al-Adhamiyah — reveals in clarity the Great Lie of the US-led occupation of Iraq. This is nothing more than the implementation of apartheid and sectarianism by a foreign military police state, aimed to break the will of Iraqis who refuse to cede their country, its resources and future to foreign powers and their local lackeys.

Neither this tactic nor others will defeat the heroic resistance of the Iraqi people, which is borne both of situation and history, culture and progress. Sectarianism and apartheid cannot break the geopolitical unity of Iraq, which is a historical, social, economic and cultural reality.
The writing is already on the wall: the US-led occupation is bankrupt, morally, politically, economically and militarily; Maliki’s puppet government exposed as the desperate, mercenary, sectarian, seditious, incompetent, corrupt and backward cabal that it is.

Apartheid, not protection

While US troops and contractors work in haste by night, and under military cover, to wall-in “selected” neighbourhoods in Baghdad, Maliki says one thing and his advisors another. Confronted by the ignominy of the similarity between the barricades his government shunts the Iraqi people behind and the vast Zionist offensive fortification splitting occupied Palestine, Maliki backtracked, saying there are “other ways to protect” Baghdad.

But these walls — vast concrete blocks that the US occupation is manufacturing at a rate of 2000 per week — continue to be constructed and have nothing to do with protection and everything to do with instituting a sectarian division of Baghdad ahead of plans to divide the whole of Iraq along sectarian lines.

By plain logic, when the occupation builds barriers in Iraq it imposes the existence of sectarian or ethnic differences. This sectarianism was brought with the US occupation and is a keystone of its strategy. That Baghdad and Iraq continue to be united in the heart of the population is a defeat for the occupation. Walls are imposed to break this unity, while at the same time they are proof of the failure and despair of the occupation and its puppets.

Not only immoral, but illegal under international law

The option of general imprisonment is not a new strategy, nor limited to Al-Adhamiyah. Al-Dawra, Al-Ghazaliyah, Al-Amiriya, Al-Amel and Al-Adl — all in Baghdad — are among 10-30 other Baghdad neighbourhoods slated to be sealed to the outside world, joining Tel Afar, Fallujah, Al-Qaim, Samarra, Yathreb, Al-Ratba, Haditha, Hit and Al Khalidiyah as besieged “gated communities”, leaving hundreds of thousands of people under de facto house arrest and whole cities, towns and districts in de facto solitary confinement.

“Public order” and the exigencies of “security” cannot be used as justification for ghettoising whole neighbourhoods, towns and cities when the US-led invasion of Iraq was illegal, the subsequent occupation illegal, the puppet government but a furtherance of those illegalities, and current US military tactics but an attempt to quash the legal resistance of Iraqis to colonialism, occupation and aggression in violation of their right to self-determination.[i]
International humanitarian and human rights law prohibits collective punishment, mass civilian imprisonment, and grave violations of rights to freedom of movement.[ii] Occupying powers are also prohibited from engineering demographic changes in occupied countries under the laws of war. Forcible division of the population of Iraq — whether nationally or locally — is a war crime.[iii]
Plans for Al-Adhamiyah reveal other more nefarious aims common to plans to wall-in other Baghdad communities: Al-Adhamiyah is a historic bastion of culture, science, progress, and resistance to colonialism and imperialism. It is a centre of the national sentiment from which has emerged a sustained popular resistance to occupation. Walling-in Al-Adhamiyah is prelude to a wave of assassinations, mass violations of human rights, and political ethnic cleansing.

Stop the walls; stop the occupation!

Despite four years of brutal military aggression, the United States refuses to understand that by definition the Iraqi resistance is the entire Iraqi population resisting occupation. This desperate bid to create ghettos that can be cleansed of that legal resistance is assured to fail, short of complete annihilation of the entire resisting national population.

With polls reporting that over 80 per cent of Iraqis refuse the occupation, the US and its sectarian puppets will have to pacify, imprison or kill over 18 million Iraqis to succeed. America’s destiny in Iraq is thus a destiny of being rejected. The US occupation should accept its defeat and get out.

Every past attempt to ghettoise, wall-in or collectively imprison a population — from Warsaw to Vietnam and Algeria, through South Africa and occupied Palestine — has failed morally and militarily. US plans for Al-Adhamiyah, and indeed the entirety of Iraq, will likewise end up in the rubbish bin of history.

We call on people of integrity and conscience — workers, lawyers, parliamentarians, syndicates, activists, militants and practitioners — to raise their voices in protest, disgust and action:

Stop the military funding.
Stop the walls.
Stop the torture.
Stop the rapes.
Stop the assassinations.
Stop the plunder.
Stop the lies.
Stop the impunity.
Stop the illegalities.
Stop the occupation.
Recognise the resistance!

The BRussells Tribunal Committee
http://brusselstribunal.org/
Please endorse and circulate this statement widely.
For information contact and endorsement: info@brusselstribunal.org

THE WALLS OF SHAME IN IRAQ, PALESTINE, IRELAND...

Mr. Bush, Tear Down These Walls!
by Scott Ritter
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/04/26/765/
(Excerpt)
The ongoing policy of building walls in Baghdad designed to segregate Sunni neighborhoods from Shiite neighborhoods is as morally despicable as it is ineffective. The Soviets built walls; the Nazis walled off entire communities, often as a precursor to rounding up the segregated population and shipping it off to concentration camps. History has rightly condemned both practices. The only modern nation that actively incorporates the construction of walls as an aspect of domestic and foreign policy is Israel, and its policy of apartheid regarding the Palestinians is morally indefensible. That the party of Ronald Reagan would willingly ally itself with those who embrace policies so rightly and strongly condemned by America’s 40th president speaks volumes to the moral vacuum it is operating in today. What is the next step these erstwhile “Reaganites” propose to undertake in Baghdad when the construction of walls fails to impede those who fight for the liberation of their nation from the tyranny of a brutal occupier? Concentration camps?


Irish Peace Laureate Shot By Israeli Troops at Non-Violent Protest - Why Isn’t This News?
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/04/25/739/
April 25, 2007
by Robert Naiman
If you listened to Democracy Now on Monday, you already know the following:
Irish Nobel Peace Laureate Mairead Maguire was among a number of people shot Friday by Israeli troops at a nonviolent protest of the “apartheid wall” in the Palestinian village of Bil’in, near Ramallah.
But if you didn’t listen to Democracy Now Monday, you probably didn’t know that.
Maguire was shot with what the Israeli military - and some press reports - misleading refer to as a “rubber bullet” - that is, a rubber-coated steel bullet.Why isn’t this “news” in the United States? There’s nothing on the web sites of the New York Times, the Washington Post, or the Los Angeles Times, not even a wire story.


THE GREAT WALL OF SEGREGATION...
By Riverbend
Thursday, April 26, 2007
http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/

…Which is the wall the current Iraqi government is building (with the support and guidance of the Americans). It's a wall that is intended to separate and isolate what is now considered the largest 'Sunni' area in Baghdad- let no one say the Americans are not building anything. According to plans the Iraqi puppets and Americans cooked up, it will 'protect' A'adhamiya, a residential/mercantile area that the current Iraqi government and their death squads couldn't empty of Sunnis.

The wall, of course, will protect no one. I sometimes wonder if this is how the concentration camps began in Europe. The Nazi government probably said, "Oh look- we're just going to protect the Jews with this little wall here- it will be difficult for people to get into their special area to hurt them!" And yet, it will also be difficult to get out.

The Wall is the latest effort to further break Iraqi society apart. Promoting and supporting civil war isn't enough, apparently- Iraqis have generally proven to be more tenacious and tolerant than their mullahs, ayatollahs, and Vichy leaders. It's time for America to physically divide and conquer- like Berlin before the wall came down or Palestine today. This way, they can continue chasing Sunnis out of "Shia areas" and Shia out of "Sunni areas".

I always hear the Iraqi pro-war crowd interviewed on television from foreign capitals (they can only appear on television from the safety of foreign capitals because I defy anyone to be publicly pro-war in Iraq). They refuse to believe that their religiously inclined, sectarian political parties fueled this whole Sunni/Shia conflict. They refuse to acknowledge that this situation is a direct result of the war and occupation.

They go on and on about Iraq's history and how Sunnis and Shia were always in conflict and I hate that. I hate that a handful of expats who haven't been to the country in decades pretend to know more about it than people actually living there.I remember Baghdad before the war- one could live anywhere. We didn't know what our neighbors were- we didn't care. No one asked about religion or sect. No one bothered with what was considered a trivial topic: are you Sunni or Shia? You only asked something like that if you were uncouth and backward. Our lives revolve around it now. Our existence depends on hiding it or highlighting it- depending on the group of masked men who stop you or raid your home in the middle of the night.


America turns Baghdad into Belfast
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
By Eugene Robinson
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2003678012_robinson24.html?syndication=rss

Meanwhile, back in Baghdad, we're building a wall. Actually, quite a few walls.

While we were absorbed with the terrible tragedy at Virginia Tech -- and before that the Don Imus affair and the Attorney General Alberto Gonzales tragicomedy -- the war in Iraq was pushed below the fold. While we weren't looking, the U.S. military started building high walls in parts of the Iraqi capital to separate Sunnis from Shiites.

Basically, we're turning Baghdad into Belfast.

This is supposed to be a temporary expedient, a way to tamp down Iraq's sectarian civil war -- in the capital, at least, which is the ostensible goal of George W. Bush's fraudulent "surge" policy -- by making it harder for the antagonists to get at each other's throats.

The so-called "peace lines" in Belfast, separating Protestants from Catholics, were supposed to be temporary, too. That network of walls was begun in the 1970s.

The construction of barriers and checkpoints that turn Baghdad neighborhoods into what U.S. officers sardonically call "gated communities" is another sign -- as if more evidence were needed -- that Bush's "surge" is nothing more than a maneuver intended to buy time.

DIVIDING BAGHDAD

While Al-Maliki halts the walling-in of Al-Adhamiyah, other districts are to be sealed off, writes Nermeen Al-Mufti

http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/842/re5.htm
26 April - 2 May 2007

Suicide attacks in Al-Sadriya, Sadr City, and Al-Kirada claimed over 200 lives in Baghdad last week. Meanwhile, the wall being built around Al-Adhamiyah attracted much comment in the local, Arab and Western media. Contradictory official statements regarding the wall offered further proof that Iraq still lacks a cohesive security strategy, despite the much-vaunted Operation Imposing Law. Concrete walls have been coming up in Baghdad since the security crackdown started over two months ago. Baghdad's inhabitants are now concerned that entire neighbourhoods will end up isolated or divided along sectarian lines.

At first, Al-Adhamiyah's inhabitants thought the concrete blocks were like others erected over the past few years. But when the US media started quipping about the Great Wall of Al-Adhamiyah, concern turned into alarm. US army public relations officer Sergeant Mike Pryor said that the wall was a "central component" of a new strategy to break the cycle of sectarian violence. Pryor said that the construction of the 3.5 metre high wall was still underway. Once the wall is completed, Iraqi-manned checkpoints would be the only way for inhabitants to enter or leave Al-Adhamiyah. According to The Wall Street Journal, other walls are being constructed around the dominantly Sunni Al-Dawra district in southern Baghdad.

Al-Adhamiyah's inhabitants, worried by US media reports, decided to organise a protest march against the wall last Monday. The government reacted by declaring a curfew on that day. Speaking in Cairo, Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki said that he "objected" to the wall and gave orders to halt its construction. But senior Iraqi officers admit that other walls are being planned for Baghdad. Qasem Al-Mousawi, official spokesman for Operation Imposing Law, said that the "encirclement of some turbulent areas would give security forces a better chance of carrying out their duties. Every area that would be encircled would have one entry point and one exit point," he said. Maryim Al-Rayyes, Maliki's advisor on foreign affairs, said the Iraqi government knew about the wall.

The controversy induced by the wall is a reminder that a few months ago, a plan was suggested to dig a moat around Baghdad in order to stop the infiltration of suicide and car bombers. The plan was rigorously attacked and subsequently discarded. But now, Iraqis fear that other areas such as Falluja and Haditha will eventually be declared out of bounds. Several towns are already constantly besieged, such as Yathreb, Al-Ratba and Al-Qaim.

In another development, the Supreme Court has called on parliament to remove the immunity of Adnan Al-Duleimi, head of the Reconciliation Bloc, who stands accused of "terror". Parliamentarian Mohamed Al-Deini scoffed at the idea. "Anyone who dares to speak of the official chaos, the occupation, and the interference of neighbouring countries is automatically labelled a 'terrorist', even if he were a member of parliament."

Al-Deini, who is leaving soon for a visit to the US, told Al-Ahram Weekly that he intends to expose all the mishaps of the occupation. "The Iraqi resistance is not just changing the face of Iraq. It is changing the face of the US administration itself. Public opinion is shifting in the US and around the world. Iraqi resistance is not terror or insurgency, but a legitimate action against occupation."

A source at the Iraqi Defence Ministry said that after Al-Adhamiyah and Al-Dawra other neighbourhoods would be surrounded with walls, including the predominantly Sunni Al-Amiriya, Al-Amel and Al-Adl districts, as well as the predominantly Shia Sadr City.

Although six Katyusha rockets hit Al-Adhamiyah last Saturday, some of its inhabitants voiced concern that the wall would worsen sectarian tensions. Ammar Al-Adhami, an engineer, said that the "government keeps insisting that military action and security plans are the solution. But the opposite is true. The walls in Al-Adhamiyah and other areas prove that the government and occupation forces have failed to bring law and order in Baghdad." The wall may end up separating lifelong neighbours, he pointed out.

Meanwhile, Kirkuk remains a matter of hot contention, with the Kurds insisting that normalisation should proceed according to Article 140 of the constitution. Kurdish parliamentarian Mahmoud Othman warned that the Kurdish bloc would withdraw from the political process unless Article 140 is implemented in full. "Under international law, we have the right to create a Kurdish state," he said. Other Kurdish officials, however, deny any plans to form a separate state. Still, they want the dominantly Turkoman Kirkuk to be officially joined to their areas.

© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved

TURKMEN ARTIST NAJIM H. CHECHEN

New York Turkmen Institute

Turkmen Iraqi - American Artist Fosters Healing Through His Art
Benefit Exhibit with artist Najim H. Chechen

Friday May 18 6:00-8:00pm, a Reception will be held for a Humanitarian Relief Benefit Exhibit featuring the sculpture by Iraqi born, Turkmen artist Najim H Chechen and the opening of his show Healing Through Art. This exhibit celebrates the beauty of Turkman culture in Iraq.

Pomegranate Gallery located at: 133 Greet Street, New York, NY
(212) 260-4014 info@turkmeninstitute.org

About the Artist

Najim H. Chechen, born in Kirkuk, Iraq is a Turkmen Iraqi-American who has been living in the US for the past 23 years. He is a professional artist who creates sculpture, pastels and drawings and who has over 30 years experience sculpting and drawing the human figure. Mr. Chechen still has relatives struggling to survive in both his hometown of Kirkuk and Baghdad where he spent his university day. Mr. Chechen earned a Masters of Fine Arts degree from Pratt Institute in 1984 and Bachelors of Fine Arts degree from the Academy of Fine Art, University of Baghdad in 1970. He founded the Fine Art Studios Sculpture Center in Orange County, NY which operates both a year round series of workshops for adults as well as a bronze casting foundry. He is also co-founder of the Hudson Valley Sculptors Society, an organization of sculptors who live and work in the Hudson Valley. Mr. Chechen has exhibited locally, nationally and internationally. He has been awarded numerous awards, scholarships and honors. His work is highly inventive, expressive and playful. ”In this exhibition, my recent works reflect the dreams for the future that Iraqi people have. The moms, dads and kids of Iraq have dreams too, just like everyone else. With my recent sculpture, I aim to represent the invisible spirit and soul and make it visible. All my figures peer out at the world and ask what will follow next. They look with anticipation, with hope. They are vulnerable but they love life and have a will to survive.”

THE REALITY OF THE TURKMEN POPULATION IN IRAQ

by Ali Kocak
The Reality of the Turkmen Population in Iraq

http://www.turkofamerica.com/article.php?module=magazines&action=showarticle&language=tr&id=426&template=magazines_showarticle

The dilemma of the Turkmen population in Iraq has become a real irony. Although in the era of post Saddam Hussein, Iraq’s ethnic and sectarian diversity has become well-recognized in the United States and in the world, the Turkmens are being slipped off the pages despite their claim of being the third largest nationality in Iraq, and they are banging on the door for national recognition and self - determination.

On the one hand, the Turkmens claim that their population in Iraq is more than 3 million (13% of Iraq’s population); but on the other hand most of the major media and the scholars in the United States present them in very diverse numbers ranging anywhere from 100 thousand to a million [Graham Fuller, 72 Foreign Affairs, 121 1992-1993], or up to 1.5 million [Inquiry Magazine, February 1987 London].

This ambiguity and the diversity in the numbers makes us wonder and ask what is the reality of the Turkmens and their population in this melting pot which makes up Iraq’s diverse ethnic and sectarian mixture. The reality of this diverse distribution and the share of the Turkmens in this mixture have long been suppressed throughout the years. The Turkmens claim further that even in the post Saddam era, for intentional and unintentional reasons, they have been undercounted and their significant presence in Iraq has been forgotten.

To understand the reality of the Turkmens in Iraq and the source of their claim, one may need to consider reviewing some historical facts: In accordance with decisions made during the Lausanne Treaty, a Committee was established to investigate the Social, Economic and the Ethnic structure of the Mosul Province.

The established Committee concluded with the following reports: The only official newspaper published in Kirkuk was in Turkish. British political officers, among the local languages, were able to speak only in Turkish. The population of Altinkopru, Tuzhurmatu, Taze hurmatu and the 75% of Karetepe were inhabited by Turkmens. The population of Taze hurmatu and Tavuk were made up of Turkmens, though in the villages there were some Kurdish inhabitants.

The commission, in their report, also considered and reflected observations made by British traveler Oliver in 1809 about the area. Based on the observations, the Committee reported that the distribution of the population in the Mosul Province was as follows [Dr.Fazıl Hüseyin, Musul Meseles (Mosul issues), S.95 Baghdad 1967]: Christian: 7000 - 8000 Jews: 1000 Arabs: 25000 Kurds: 15000 -16000 Turkmens: 15000 -16000.

The first draft and the original constitution of Iraq were written in three languages: Arabic, Kurdish and Turkish. According to article 74 of Iraq’s constitution, published in 1931, Turkish should be the court language in areas in which the Turkmen population is in majority. The first census in Iraq was conducted in 1947 and it showed a population of 4,816,185 [The New York Times, September 14, 1957] However, the first census which included the ethic structure of Iraq was conducted in 1957 and showed the total population of Iraq as 6,300,000, while the Turkmen population was estimated to be 567,000 [Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, Volume 24, Number 2, October 2004, pp. 309-325(17)].

After the “1958 revolution”, the new government estimated the Turkmen population, based on 1957 census results, to be 570,000 and in 1965, according to Iraq’s Ministry of Planning, Department of Statistics, the Turkmen population was estimated to be 780,000. According to the statistical data provided by the Iraqi Government, Iraq’s life statistical results showed the following: Population density per square kilometer was: 42 person /km2 Average Birth rate: 4.5% Average population increase: 3.7% Average births per woman: 7 children Death rate: 0.87%.

In reference to the statistical data provided above, Iraq’s population was estimated to increase from (11, 505,000) in 1976 to (18,100,000) in 1988 [Iraq’s Ministry of Planning].

Based on these data and projections for the years 1921, 1926, 1947, 1957, 1959, and 1965, the estimated percentages of Iraq’s ethnic structure were as follows: Christians: 3% , Turkmens: 16%, Kurds: 18%, Arabs: 63%. The distribution of ethnic groups in Iraq’s total population (18,100,000) in the year 1988 was estimated as below: Christians: 546,000 Turkmens: 2,880,000 Kurds: 3,240,000 Arabs: 11,444,000.

In accordance with the data presented by Iraq’s Ministry of Planning, the population of Iraq in the year 2000 was shown to be 20,000,000. Based on this figure and the previous estimation, the Turkmen population in the year 2000 was estimated to be 3, 200,000. 15% of this population inhabits Arbil and 85% live in Kirkuk and Mosul, with some in Baghdad.



Copyright © 2004 Turk of America, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

THE ANCIENT CITADEL IN KERKUK HAS NEVER BEEN KURDISH!

THE ANCIENT CITADEL "KERKÜK KALASI" IN KERKÜK HAS NEVER BEEN KURDISH!

Michael Totten in his article posts photographs of The Citadel of Kerkuk and writes:
“Below are satellite images of a Kurdish neighborhood in Kirkuk in 1997 and 1998 before and after an ethnic cleansing bombardment.”

Contrary to what pseudo-reporter Michael Totten (see link below) writes, the Ancient Citadel of Kerkuk has never been Kurdish. Totten hasn’t got a clue about the history of the north of Iraq, he only repeats like a parrot what the chief of a Kurdish gang tells him. This is what I call unprofessional journalism, it’s dishonest and misleading. Totten never bothered to meet with the original inhabitants of Kerkuk, the Turkmens. Had he discussed the region’s history with Turkmen intellectuals he would not be writing such rubbish and misinforming his readers.

Totten’s articles about Iraq abound in inaccuracies and false information, but Totten is not only ignorant about Kerkuk’s history, he doesn’t even know that Hamburg is not the capital of Germany! Here again, like a parrot he repeats and takes for granted what his Mam Rostam, his Kurdish host tells him: “In Hamburg, Germany, there was a restaurant opposite the Turkish Embassy”!!!. One doesn’t have to be a “professional journalist” to know that Embassies are only located in the capital city of a country, but Totten doesn’t know…yet he has the cheek to write about Iraq’s history for his folk back home!

http://www.michaeltotten.com/archives/001417.html

I strongly recommend to those who wish to find the truth about KERKUK’s history and about the CITADEL OF KERKUK to read Dr. Suphi Saatçi’s well documented and beautifully illustrated book : The Urban Fabric and Traditional Houses of KERKUK (see my previous post).

Extract (Page 43) Dr. Suphi Saatçi writes:

‘ The most noteworthy aspect of Kirkuk’s Citadel, the urban fabric of which is lost almost completely, is that it housed the most significant examples of traditional residential architecture in the city. Most of the 800 houses located here were important examples of traditional Turkmen residential architecture (Figure 42) Only forty-five of them survive to this day, particularly as a result of recent assaults. Five or six of them were repaired, but their wooden doors and windows have been plundered since April 19, 2003 when Peshmergas entered the city”

____________________
Michael J Totten’s reaction :

For God's sake, Blue Woman, I know very well that Hamburg isn't the capital of Germany. Errors inside quotes from other people are their errors, not mine.
I am also well aware of the tendency of Middle Easterners to inflate their ethnic and sectarian numbers in relation to the others. I'm sure Rostam does it, just as I'm sure you do it. I left out Rostam's numbers about the Kurds in Kirkuk because what he said is as unreliable as what you're saying.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at April 26, 2007 11:17 AM

Anyway, Turkey has a consulate in Hamburg. It was firebombed by terrorists in 1993.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at April 26, 2007 12:53 PM

__________________________________________
Blue woman’s comments:

For God's sake, Michael Totten, stop equalizing the victims with the aggressors, as you westerners have been doing for decades in all conflicts in the Middle East, starting from Palestine and ending in Iraq.

Concerning the north of Iraq, you are putting me at the level of your Mam Rostam, who you are promoting as a new ‘Rambo’ while in actual fact he is nothing else but a gang leader, smuggler, killer and contrabandist who became one of the representatives of a community which has shamefully collaborated with the aggressors of the Iraqi people and the occupiers of Iraq after an illegal war of aggression for their self-interest and against the legitimate interests of the majority of the Iraqi people.

Mam Rostam and his gang who you are promoting and elevating to the status of a nation in the north of Iraq, mainly to break Iraq, to divide it and plunder its wealth, have always worked against the interest of the majority of the Iraqis.

Today, the Kurds are openly and unjustly marginalizing all the other inhabitants of the north of Iraq, especially the Turkmens who are incontestably not only the third main ethnic component of the Iraqi people representing 12% of Iraq’s total population but also undeniably the second main ethnic group of the north of Iraq, with their community counting no less than 3 million Turkmens representing at least 30% of the population of the north of Iraq, where Mam Rostam and his gang with the blessing of the Anglo-American aggressors of the Iraqi people have imposed their hegemony and are now denying the Turkmens their basic and legitimate rights, their history, their representation and the existence of their region ‘TURKMENELI’ in the north of Iraq.

Indeed, a few weeks ago Mr. Massud Barzani, the president of the Kurdish regional government ‘KRG’, passing beyond all limits of honesty, decency and objectivity, bluntly declared that the Turkmens were ‘only a few thousands’ in Kerkuk and he threatened Iraq’s northern neighbour, Turkey - who fed him and his family and who supported him and his group for decades - to intervene in its internal affairs creating problems in Turkey, if the Turks rejects his (Mr Barzani’s) lucubration, fallacious theory and ambition to create a state within the Iraqi state and come to the defence of their cousins, the Turkmens of Iraq , whose existence is threatened and whose legitimate rights and true representation in the north of Iraq are denied by the Kurds.

It is only the beginning of another source of problems for the entire Middle-East and for the majority of the people of this region that your Mam Rostam and his group are actively working to create, unfortunately reporters like yourself are willingly helping them to achieve their objective by diffusing their lies and their propaganda without any reservation and without any verification about their rightness and about the veracity of their declarations!

Time has come to stop throwing oil on the fire that the new crusaders led by the anglo-americans occupiers of Iraq have ignited in the region.

Concerning the inhabitants of the towns and cities of the north of Iraq I recommend you consult the “Ethnographical map – to show distribution of races in Northern Iraq” drawn by the British in 1922 for the purpose of their negotiations with Turkey before the signature of the Lausanne Treaty in July 1923.

You can refer to the British National Archives, London. File No. F.O.925/41335.

Even though this map is biased as it was drawn by the British to serve their imperialistic objectives for the negotiations with Turkey for the signature of the Lausanne Treaty and was intended to reduce the Turkmen importance and representation in the north of Iraq (Mosul Vilayat) and to limit the Turkmen region to a minimum minimorum for their imperialistic objectives, this map nonetheless indicates that: Tel Afer, villages around Mosul, Erbil, Altunkopru, Kerkuk, Tuz Khurmatu, Kifri, Karatepe, Khanekin, Kizlarbat, Mendeli, etc. were Turkmen towns and cities.


Posted by: Blue Woman at April 27, 2007 06:52 AM

IRAQIS UNITED AGAINST THE OCCUPIERS' SECTARIAN WALL

Wathiq Kuzaie/AFP

"With our unity we destroy all the walls of the occupation"

IRAQIS SAY NO TO GHETTOS

Muqtada al-Sadr has called for more demonstrations against the wall.

"This wall shows the evil will of the occupier and its sectarian and terrorist projects against our people," al-Sadr said in a statement. "We the people of Iraq will defend Azamiyah and other neighborhoods that you (Americans) want to segregate from us. We will stand hand in hand with you (Sunnis) to demonstrate and protect our holy land."

IMPORTANT NEW BOOK ON KERKÜK

The Urban Fabric and Traditional Houses of KIRKUK
By Dr. Suphi Saatçi, Professor of Architecture

Translated by Dr. Mehmet Bengü Uluengin
Dr Professor Zeynep Ahunbay edited the English copy
First edition: January 2007
ISBN 975-6849-19-3
200 Pages
Kerkük Vakfi
Istanbul 2007

Preface (excerpt)

Throughout history the city has been Turkoman, yet recent political debates have attempted to mask this fact and blur its ethnic and cultural identity. Kerkuk, as such, is a contested and troubled city.

It is obvious that such political distortions cannot be successful for long. Likewise, it should not be forgotten that unjust approaches to such problems only bring resentment, and are not sustainable in the long run.

Before attempting to comment on the ethnic and cultural make up of a city, its architectural fabric must be studied. The way local culture and social life are reflected on the city’s architecture, the traditions prevalent in the area and primary sources such as the biographies of master masons, building inscriptions and local architectural terminology, are of utmost importance in this regard. It is the goal of this book to demonstrate the utility of such sources in gaining insight into a particular locale or city.

With the publication of this book in English, I believe the Western world will have the opportunity to get to know Kirkuk closely. While this book, no doubt, should have been published earlier, even this tardy debut will serve a noble purpose.

Suphi Saatçi, Istanbul August 2006

Chapter One : Introduction
Chapter Two: The City of Kirkuk
Chapter Three: The Traditional Houses of Kirkuk
Chapter Four: Observations on the Folklore of Traditional Construction
Chapter Five: Witnesses of History: Building and Tomb Inscriptions
Chapter Six: Conclusion