TURKISH PRIME MINISTER WARNS IRAQI KURDS AGAINST SEEKING CONTROL OF OIL-RICH KIRKUK

International Herald Tribune, France
The Associated Press
Jan 16 2007

ANKARA, Turkey: Turkey’s prime minister warned Iraqi Kurdish groups
Tuesday against trying to seize control of the northern Iraqi city of
Kirkuk. Kurdish lawmakers responded by accusing Ankara of interfering
in internal Iraqi matters.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey will not stand by amid
growing tensions among ethnic Turkmens, Arabs and Kurds in Iraq’s
oil-rich north. Turkish lawmakers are to discuss Kirkuk and Iraq on
Thursday, and Turkey’s main opposition party has said it would back
a cross-border offensive to quell a Kurdish rebellion.

Iraqi Kurds, who claim the region as their own and hope to eventually
include Kirkuk in an enclave of self-rule in northern Iraq, responded
by accusing Turkey of interfering in Iraqi internal affairs.

Kurdish legislators in Iraq’s parliament "condemn this interference
in Iraqi affairs by the Turkish government (and) … call upon
parliament to issue a statement condemning them as well," they said
in a statement Tuesday.

Kurdish lawmakers urged parliament to "call upon the Iraqi government
and the Foreign Ministry to take a decisive stance to stop this
interference, and to threaten to cut political and the economic
relations with Turkey in case Turkey keeps its interference."

Turkey fears Iraq’s Kurds want Kirkuk’s lucrative oil to fund a bid
for independence that could encourage separatist Kurdish guerrillas
in Turkey who have been fighting since 1984 for autonomy.

Erdogan chided an Iraqi Kurdish group for denouncing an Ankara
conference on Kirkuk’s future, saying Turkey "cannot digest their
words" and cannot stand such criticism, recalling how Turkey sheltered
more than 500,000 Iraqi Kurdish refugees who escaped the Iraqi army’s
bombardment following a failed Kurdish insurgency in early 1991.

Erdogan reminded Kurds of his country’s historical and ethnic ties
to the region.

"Turkey did not remain indifferent to the plight of Kurdish peshmergas
who were escaping oppression and death," he said. "Today, it will
not remain indifferent to the Turkmens, Arabs … in Kirkuk."

Kirkuk, an ancient city that once was part of the Ottoman Empire,
has a large minority of ethnic Turks as well as Christians, Shiite
and Sunni Arabs, Armenians and Assyrians.

Since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, thousands of Kurds
pushed out of the region under Saddam Hussein’s rule have flooded
back to Kirkuk.

Kirkuk lies just south of the autonomous Kurdish region stretching
across Iraq’s northeast. Kurdish leaders want to annex the city,
and Iraq’s constitution calls for a referendum on the issue by the
end of next year.

U.S. legislators have warned that Kirkuk is a "powder keg" and have
recommended that the referendum be delayed.