PM Barzani condemns 'systematic' Arabization in Kirkuk

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani on Tuesday condemned "systematic" Arabization in Kirkuk, saying forced demographic change will not be tolerated by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).  

"With extreme concern, we are monitoring the situation of the Kurdistani areas outside of the administration of the Kurdistan Region, especially in Kirkuk province where unfortunately the policy of Arabization and demographic change continues in a systematic way," Prime Barzani said in a statement.

"What really concerns us and what we have found strange is that such acts are taking place in a democratic Iraq where, according to the constitution, a roadmap is laid out on how to normalize the statute of the disputed areas," the PM added.

A concerted effort under former President Saddam Hussein,mostly between 1970 and 1978, brought Arabs from elsewhere in Iraq to the disputed area of Kirkuk. After 2003, however, Iraq began a policy of de-Arabization to reverse the demographic changes.

Within the framework of Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution, land was returned to the previous Kurdish inhabitants. But since 2017, when Kurds lost the military and administrative ruling of the province to a major military incursion by the Iraqi forces, there have been reports of Arab settlers reclaiming these lands.

 "We strongly condemn the policy of the Arabization in the disputed areas and Kirkuk in particular [and] we reaffirm that the Kurdistan Regional Government will never tolerate this policy, especially the return of and resettling of some people who are not the indigenous people of these areas," said Barzani.

In his Tuesday statement, PM Barzani also called on Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, Special Representative of the Secretary-General of the United Nations in Iraq to make efforts to  "prevent these dangerous violations being committed against the indigenous people by the local authorities.'

A delegation from the KRG has been assigned to visit Baghdad to talk to the federal government authorities on the matter at hand.

Kirkuk is disputed between the federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), and is home to Kurdish, Arab, Turkmen, and Christian inhabitants. Other disputed territories lie in the provinces of Nineveh, Diyala and Salahaddin. 

Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution was supposed to have resolved the issue of the disputed provinces by 2007, but successive governments have failed to implement the steps outlined in the provision.

The province's southern district of Daquq, and the town of Sargaran west of Kirkuk city are the flashpoint of ongoing Arabization efforts since October 2017.

"We are calling on the federal government to take necessary measures based on the constitutional powers they wield to prevent some of the local administrative authorities from continuing to carry out this policy,” he said. “They should decide to avoid the armed forces from involving in this policy and from being used," Barzani added.

On Sunday, 14 Kurdish political parties also warned of continued efforts to revive Arabization in Kirkuk.

The ruling Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) did not attend the meeting in Kirkuk. The KDP is the only Kurdish political party that has not returned to Kirkuk since October 2017. It boycotted the May 2018 Iraqi parliamentary elections in Kirkuk, calling the city “occupied and sold out” due to the presence of Iraqi forces.

Shakhawan Abdulla, an outspoken former KDP MP in Baghdad from Kirkuk says his party still considers the city "occupied." He says the incumbent Kirkuk governor Rakan al-Jabouri, who replaced Najmaldin Karim after he was ousted in October 2017, is "leading a group to Arabize Kirkuk."