ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Hundreds of Kurdish soldiers serving in the Iraqi army are unhappy about their deployment in Anbar province, complaining that the fierce fighting there against Islamic insurgents is not their war.
"There have been martyrs and wounded from our ranks and the situation has been very difficult for us," said Ali Harki, a Kurdish solider who spoke to Rudaw by telephone from Anbar.
The Iraqi army has been locked in fighting against Islamic insurgents and Sunni tribesmen in the cities of Ramadi and Fallujah in Anbar since going in last month to hunt al-Qaeda jihadists and dismantle anti-government protesters camped out in Ramadi for more than a year.
The Iraqi army has been involved in heavy clashes with Sunni tribes and al-Qaeda’s Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) for the last several days. Sunni tribes and the Islamic militants seized control of Fallujah last week.
The Kurds, deployed in Fallujah and other parts of Anbar, number some 500 soldiers from the 8th Brigade of the Iraqi army’s 4th Division. Previously, they were stationed in Mosul, but were transferred to Anbar in 2007 under the pretext of participating in a 45-day training exercise.
The Kurdish soldiers complain they are fighting a war that has nothing to do with them.
"It’s not clear who is enemy and who is friend; this is a political war and it’s a Sunni-Shiite war,” Harki said.
The latest fighting elevates simmering differences between the Shiite-led government in Baghdad and Iraq’s large minority Sunnis to another level.
Kurds actively participated in rebuilding the Iraqi army after the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein. They initially comprised 7 percent of the army. But that went down to 2 percent after many defected and Baghdad refused to implement a pre-2007 resolution to incorporate more Kurds and increase Kurdish participation in the military.
According to the Iraqi constitution, the army should reflect the different ethnicities according to their size.
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), which controls its own Peshmarga military force, says it does not have the authority to call on the Kurds fighting in Anbar to withdraw.
"Officially, we can’t call them back here, but we have not disappointed anyone who has returned in the past and even in the future," said a Kurdish government official.
Contrary to the feelings expressed by Kurdish soldiers in Anbar, last month the secretary-general of the Peshmarga Ministry, Lieutenant-General Jabbar Yawar, said that Peshmarga forces were ready for a part in a military operation in the Anbar desert if requested by the central government in Baghdad.
So far the Peshmarga, who are officially recognized as part of the Iraqi military, have not been deployed in Anbar.
Baghdad and Erbil have been at loggerheads over several issues, including the Peshmarga. Erbil accuses Baghdad of refusing to pay the constitutional portion of the Peshmarga budget. Recently, the Peshmarga ministry said Baghdad owes 15 trillion Iraqi dinars (ID) -- roughly about $15 billion -- in arrears.
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