Maliki makes his move on Kirkuk issueMiddleEast Dec 22, 2009
Maliki makes his move on Kirkuk issueBy Sami Moubayed
DAMASCUS - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki will soon visit the northerndistrict of Kurdistan, aiming to sign a deal with Kurdish President MassoudBarzani regarding the future of the Peshmerga, the Kurdish militia.
According to the deal, the Baghdad government will recognize and therebylegitimize the Kurdish militia and, in turn, the Kurdish government willrelease money collected from taxes and tariffs that it has so far withheld fromthe central government. This also means that salaries and pensions of the90,000-man Peshmerga, previously paid for by the Kurdistan government, willbecome the responsibility of the Maliki government.
Is the Maliki visit purely domestic, aimed at diverting attention
from the recent bombings in Baghdad and creating allies for
the prime ministerahead of the March 2010 elections? Or is it a result of a recent US declarationsupporting implementation of
Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution, which callsfor a
referendum in the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, to see whether its inhabitantswant to remain part of Iraq or join the district of Iraqi Kurdistan? Kurdistanalready has 10-15% of Iraq’s oil reserves, while Kirkuk alone holds as much as25%, meaning that if the Kurds get to
incorporate it, they will control no lessthan 40% of oil reserves in Iraq.
That referendum should have been held two years ago, but has been continuallydelayed by the central government, which fears Iraq's Arab Shi'ites and Sunniswould never tolerate it, and nor would regional players Iran, Turkey, SaudiArabia and Syria.
Maliki cuddled up to the Kurds in 2007, after losing some of his principalSunni and Shi'ite allies, promising to uphold Article 140, to remain on thegood side of Iraqi Kurds. He also indirectly sponsored the
transfer of Arabsfrom within Kirkuk (there are 12,000 Arab families in the city) to other partsof Iraq ahead of the proposed referendum, claiming that they had been broughtthere illegally by Saddam Hussein to outnumber Kurds in the city.
These gestures by Maliki helped keep his cabinet coalition alive at a time whenheavyweights such as the Sadrists, the Iraqi National List and the IraqiAccordance Front were no longer dealing with him. Matters became strained,however, when Maliki failed to put his words into action, repeatedly delayingthe referendum, and did not lift a finger to prevent Turkish attacks onKurdistan in mid-2007, aimed at eliminating the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
The prime minister is apparently recalculating his relationship with the Kurds.He needs heavyweights behind him, after all, since success in the upcomingelections seems all the more difficult after the latest bombings in August,October and December. He also realizes that the
US administration of
PresidentBarack Obama is keen on resolving the Kurdish issue, after it sent a seniordiplomat, Alan Misenheimer, to reside in Kirkuk in August. Shortly before that,the Kurds were on the verge of holding a referendum on a regional constitution,unilaterally declaring their control over Kirkuk, and claiming that the Baghdadgovernment had repeatedly delayed holding the much-anticipated yetcontroversial referendum.
Kirkuk came to the world's attention during the era of Iraq's founder, KingFaysal I, when an oil gusher was discovered in 1927. The oilfield was put intooperation by the Iraqi Petroleum Co in 1934 and has been producing oil eversince, currently up to a million barrels per day (half of all Iraqi oilexports). By 1998, Kirkuk still had reserves of 10 billion barrels. At the timeof the downfall of Saddam's regime, the city (250 kilometers north of Baghdad)had a population of 755,700. In 1973, Kurdish leader Mullah Mustafa al-Barzanilaid formal claim to Kirkuk, something that the regime of General Ahmad Hasanal-Bakr considered a declaration of war.
Because of numerous attacks on Iraqi oilfields in 2003-04, as well as on thecountry's 7,000km pipeline system, the US set up Task Force Shield to guard theoil
infrastructure, particularly in the Kirkuk district. In January 2004, theLos Angeles Times quoted Kurdish politician Barham Salih as saying, "We have aclaim to Kirkuk rooted in history, geography and demographics." If this claimwere not acknowledged, he added, it would be a "recipe for civil war".
If this issue is not resolved one way or another, the Americans reason, itcould spell civil war. The problem today is how sustainable any deal would bebetween Maliki and the Kurds, given the complete breakdown in trust betweenthem due to an accumulation of events since 2007. Maliki does not have muchroom to maneuver, with the Iranians and other regional players, who would neveraccept Kirkuk becoming Kurdish, breathing down his neck. Although the primeminister was brought to power by the
Americans in 2006, his connections to theUS are not nearly as strong as those of the Kurds, particularly the Barzaniclan. Both sides, however, are waiting to see where Obama will stand on theissue of Kirkuk.
His vice-president, Joe Biden, is an outspoken supporter of Kurdish claims toKirkuk, having visited the city during the transition period in late 2008,reportedly carrying a letter from then-president-elect Obama to the KirkukProvincial Council. According to the Iraqi daily Al-Zaman, the letter expressedObama's "special interest in that province". London-based al-Hayat said Bidenstressed a consensual resolution to the Kirkuk issue, which he has been pushingfor since assuming office with Obama last January. If this does happen, andcivil war does erupt, it could bring an abrupt halt to the planned US troopwithdrawal from Iraq, to take place by 2012.
Some are calling for a partitioning of the city between Kurds and Arabs, citingthe Indian city of Chandigarh, which is the
capital of both Punjab and Haryanastates. But that proposal would also be rejected by Iraqi Arabs, along with theTurks, the Saudis, the Iranians and the Syrians. If the Americans do apply hardpressure on Maliki, will he listen? Obama is not George W Bush, after all, andMaliki's fate is not 100% dependent on the Obama White House, as it was underBush.
That is why the prime minister is trying to hammer out a deal directly with theKurds themselves - hoping to delay the issue of Kirkuk until after he isre-elected in March.
Sami Moubayed is editor-in-chief of Forward Magazine in Syria.