ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – A member of Kirkuk’s Asayish security force was killed in front of his home by unknown gunmen on Saturday night. It comes amid a growing number of assassinations and kidnappings targeting Kurdish and Turkmen citizens in the disputed city. “Last night, an employee of our directorate named Samir Hassan Gharib, who is the son of Kirkuk’s renowned artist Hassan Gharib, was martyred in front of his house in the Huriyah (Freedom) neighborhood in the city of Kirkuk,” the local Asayish said in an official statement released Sunday. “It is true that last night a member of the Asayish was killed in front of his house in his car, but it is not known yet who did it and no one has been detained yet,” Afrasiaw Kamil Waisi, Kirkuk police spokesperson, told Rudaw. Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) took over Kirkuk and other disputed territories on October 16. Since then, the ISF, federal police, and Iranian-backed Hashd al-Shaabi forces have taken the city’s security into their own hands. Forty Kurdish citizens have allegedly been killed or kidnapped since the incursion. Turkmen parties claim 19 of their people have been killed. The Turkmen were fiercely opposed to the Kurdish administration of the city – a period that saw relative stability, according to Kurdish political parties. “The Iraqi government and the security forces need to realize the current danger and to also know that the Turkmen will not remain silent should this situation of them being targeted continue. The Turkmen people have their own figures, Turkmen political parties and base,” Ali Mufti, a politburo member of the Turkmeneli Party, told Rudaw. “The violations include closing down the offices of parties, assassination and kidnapping of citizens, burning and confiscating the houses of Kurdish citizens. We have recorded all of these, and the records have been given to the UN. We have also given a report to the prime minister’s office,” Shakhawan Abdullah, a Kurdish MP in the Iraqi parliament and a member of security and defense committee, told Rudaw. The security and defense committee has voted to call the current interim Sunni Arab governor of Kirkuk, Rakan al-Jabouri, before the Iraqi parliament for questioning. A report by Rudaw from Kirkuk found the Kurdish population of the city is fearful of staying out late at night. Many claim they are being silenced.
