Iraq
Mohammed Kamal, head of the KDP office in Kirkuk, speaking during a press conference on September 23, 2024. Photo: Rudaw
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Kirkuk is not ready for a population census, a Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) official said on Monday, calling for the process to be postponed in the disputed province.
“We see that a population census is necessary, but the time and the situation in Kirkuk is not ready to conduct the survey,” Mohammed Kamal, head of the KDP office in Kirkuk, said during a press conference.
Kamal reasoned the survey would not reflect the true population of the city, because the majority of the “original population” of the city was displaced by the Baathist regime.
Policies of the Baathist regime “demolished more than 4,500 Kurdish villages and displaced their inhabitants to the areas of Erbil and Sulaimani,” the KDP official added.
“The situation of Kirkuk is extraordinary; therefore, we ask for postponing the census in Kirkuk,” Kamal said.
Iraq has discussed conducting a new census for years, a process to contribute to the resolution of historic problems like Baathist-era Arabization, the status of disputed Kirkuk - claimed by the federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) - and the KRG’s federal budget share.
Kamal also called for the survey to be conducted following the implementation of a constitutional article addressing the disputed areas.
“We believe that a census must be conducted after implementing Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution. After that, we believe it is essential to hold a census across Iraq, including the city of Kirkuk,” Kamal said.
Article 140 details steps to resolve disputes between the Iraqi federal government and the KRG, as both claim jurisdiction in disputed areas such as Kirkuk. Successive federal governments have failed to implement the article.
The article calls for compensation for Arab settlers and expelled Kurds and the return of lands to their Kurdish owners. The article proposes a referendum for inhabitants of the territory to choose to join the Kurdistan Region or remain tied to the federal government by no later than 2007.
However, the article has never been implemented amid disputes between the KRG and Iraqi government.
Iraq will carry out a census in November - the first general population count since 1997 - and the first to include provinces in the Kurdistan Region since 1987.
In 2020, a census was planned for Iraq, including the Kurdistan Region, but it was postponed amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The inclusion of an ethnicity question on censuses has been a key obstacle between Baghdad and Erbil. In April, Iraq said the census will not survey citizens on ethnicity.
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