Kerkuk - Capital City of Turkmeneli (Iraqi Turkmenia) and the Pseudo-Kurdish Claims

A comprehensive diagram of the History of the Turkmen city of Kerkuk is presented in the new book about the Iraqi city, which has been elaborated by Mofak Salman Kerkuklu, one of Iraq’s foremost Turkmen scholars and intellectuals. I will publish the book in a series of articles; in this first part, I republish the various historical chapters of Mr. Mofak Salman Kerkuklu’s new contribution. In forthcoming articles, I will publish parts of the book that shed light on the recent atrocities committed there by the terrorist militias of the pseudo-Kurdish "leaders’ Talabani and Barzani.

Turkmen, Kurds and the Capital City of Turkmeneli
By Mofak Salman Kerkuklu

A key to understanding why the maintenance of Iraq's territorial integrity is viewed by many as critical is knowledge of the country's enormous ethnic and religious diversity, the aspirations of these groups and the problems they now face. One of these ethno-linguistic groups is the Turkmen, 1 who have made a major effort to define themselves, both internally and to the world community. Their real population has always been suppressed by the authorities in Iraq for political reasons and is officially estimated at 2%, whereas in reality their number should be put between 2.5 and 3 million, i.e. 12% of the Iraqi population. The Turkmen of Iraq settled in Turkmeneli (Turkmen land). 2

Over the centuries, Turkmen have played a constructive role in Iraq, either by defending against foreign invaders or by bringing civilisation. Their monuments and architectural remains exist all over Iraq and they lived in harmony with all ethnic groups around them. They lived with justice and tolerance.

The Turkmen are a Turkic group with a unique heritage and culture, as well as linguistic, historical and cultural links with the surrounding Turkic groups, such as those in Turkey and Azerbaijan. Their spoken language is closer to Azeri but their official written language is similar to the Turkish spoken in present-day Turkey. The Turkmen of Iraq settled in Turkmeneli in three successive and constant migrations from Central Asia, and increased their numbers; this enabled them to establish six states in Iraq:
1. The Seljuks
2. The Atabegs
3. The Ilkhanids
4. The Jalairids
5. The Kara Koyunlu, "Black sheep"
6. The Ak Koyunlu, "White sheep"

Turkmen have been living in present Iraq for over a millennium. Yet, since they were left outside the borders of a new Turkey in an artificially created Iraq, Turkmen felt the heavy-handed treatment by successive Arab rulers, the worst of whom were the Ba’ath Party. Though the Turkmen of Iraq consist one of the three major entities of the modern Iraqi State, the Turkmen have had the least of advantages. Since the foundation of Iraq in the aftermath of the First World War, the existence of Turkmen has been denied by the official regimes in Baghdad in accordance with the state’s policy. It was the attempt at sealing the border with Turkey that motivated the Baghdad regime, and their protector Britain, to deliberately ignore the existence of the Turkmen people in the early years of Iraq.

Turkmen at the Monarchy era

For decades, since the creation of the Iraqi State in 1921, the Turkmen of Iraq and their plight have been completely ignored by the international community. They have been the least listened to outside Iraq and the least defended by their own government. Indeed, for decades, the Turkmen have been denied their basic human rights in Iraq and have faced total indifference from the international community.

The disregard of the Turkmen’s historical role and achievements in Iraq, the denial of their true representation as the third largest ethnic group and, consequently, their marginalisation in Iraq was initiated by the British colonial authorities at the end of World War One in 1918, for geopolitical and economical reasons. The British facilitated the separation of the Mosul Vilayat ‘Mosul Province’ (now representing five Iraqi provinces: Mosul, Kirkuk, Erbil, Duhok and Suleymaniyah) from the Ottoman Empire (Turkey) in order to control the huge oil reserves of Kirkuk which was inhabited mainly by the Turkmen, as it had been for centuries.

However, after the British invasion of Iraq in 1918, the Turkmen began to experience a different situation. They were branded unjustly as being loyal to Turkey: they were removed from the administration, pushed into isolation and ignored. Then, their fundamental human rights in culture and education were violated by the closure of their schools between 1933 and 1937.

Under the constitution, drawn up in 1932, the Kurds and the Turkmen had the right to use their own languages in schools and government offices and to have their own language press. With the Arabs, the Kurds were recognised in the first constitution of monarchical Iraq as one of the three main component groups of the Iraqi nation. However, constitutional rights were acknowledged to minorities in Iraq, with the Royal Constitution of 21st March 1925, Article 16: stating, "As determined by a general programme prescribed by law, each of the minorities originating from various nations has the right to set up schools where education is provided in the language used by that minority and is entitled to be in charge of these schools." It was stated in the Royal Constitution, which was valid until 1958, that the Iraqi State consisted of Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen and other minorities.

Moreover, according to Article 14 of the same constitution, Turkmen, like other minorities, were also entitled to receive an education in their own language and to be in charge of their own educational institutions. In fact, until the proclamation of the republic, various constitutional amendments did not cause ethnic or political discrimination. However, in 1933, the final version of Article 17 of the constitution declared Arabic as the official language, with legally defined exceptions. Legislation number 74, published in 1931, and entitled ‘Native Languages’ had clearly stipulated these exceptions. This law permitted all judicial processes to be conducted in the Turkmen language and primary school education to be in the Turkish language in all areas where Turkmen lived; foremost among these being Kirkuk and Erbil, and these rights were under constitutional guarantee. However, in 1936, after the resignation of Hikmat Suleiman, the brother of Sadrazam (Chief Minister) Mahmud Shavket Pasha, from the post of Prime Minister to which he had been appointed two years previously, the new military regime began a campaign of taking back the rights given by the constitution. Thus, the Turkmen of Iraq lost the right to be educated in their native tongue.

The period of monarchy, from 1932 to 1958, saw the removal of Turkmen from government posts and their deportation to Arab areas. The suppression of the Turkmen peaked in 1946 when they were subjected to what is historically known as the Gawer Baghi massacre; when the police opened fire on unarmed protesters among the Iraqi oil workers in Kirkuk. Since then, and despite the formal independence of Iraq from Great Britain and the end of the British mandate in 1932, successive Iraqi governments have applied the same policies of marginalisation and discrimination towards the Turkmen as those that were initiated and applied by the British in 1918, and for the same geopolitical and economical reasons!

The Abdul Karim Qasim Period (1958–1963)

The military coup of 1958 that toppled the monarchy first brought rays of hope for the Turkmen when they heard radio announcements by coup leader General Abdul-Kerim Qasim and his deputy General Abdul-Salam Arif that Iraq was made up of three main ethnic groups and Turkmen were one of them. Turkmen interpreted these statements as the end of the suppression.

However, happy days did not last long. After the coup of 1958, General Abdul-Kerim Qasim declared an amnesty and, because of this, a Kurdish rebel leader Mullah Mustafa Barzani returned from the Soviet Union and started negotiating for a Kurdish autonomous region. The situation of the Turkmen deteriorated dramatically and drastically because of the hegemonic ambitions of Mullah Mustafa Barzani and his plans for an independent Kurdish state in the north of Iraq, as well as his demand for the oil wealth of Kirkuk which was not only a necessity but also the main motivation.

The existence of Turkmen in the north of Iraq, side-by-side with the Kurds, and the Turkmen presence in great numbers in Kirkuk, where for centuries they represented the majority, were seen and felt by Mullah Mustafa Barzani as obstacles to the realisation of his dreams for an independent Kurdish state and the control of Kirkuk's oil wealth.

During the time of General Abdul-Karim Qasim, the Turkmen suffered marginalisation and discrimination from both the Kurds and the Iraqi communists who dominated the regime in Iraq. They faced internal deportation, exile, arbitrary arrest and detention, confiscation of properties and agricultural land and, worst of all, the massacre of 120 of their intellectuals and community leaders on the eve of the first anniversary of the revolution on 14th July 1959 by the Kurdish rebel leader Mullah Mustafa Barzani and his Kurdish followers allied to the Iraqi communists. Kirkuk was put under curfew and its population slaughtered by Communists and Kurds. The streets of Kirkuk were filled with blood and witnessed one of its more brutal moments in history. The Turkmen in Kirkuk were attacked under the false pretext that they helped the Mosul resistance against the central government. The Kirkuk massacre was totally disregarded by the world and the whole of humanity ignored it.

It was only after this massacre that the Communist Kurds became aggressive enough to negotiate for the inclusion of Kirkuk in their autonomous region. During this period (1958–1963), a mass migration of the Kurds, from their villages and towns in the north-east of Iraq to the Turkmen region and especially to the cities of Kirkuk and Tuz Khormatu, were organised and implemented in order to increase the Kurdish presence in Kirkuk and alter the demography of this large Turkmen city.

The social era of General Abdul-Salam Arif (1963–1967)

The ensuing era of General Abdul-Salam Arif (1963–1967) was one of the best periods for Turkmen in Iraq. The culprits of the 1959 Kirkuk massacre were hanged in the two big squares of Kirkuk by the government. Turkmen were allowed to run cultural associations and schools, publish magazines and newspapers in the Latin characters of Turkish and get some posts in government. This made them very happy and they demonstrated excellently that as citizens of Iraq they could work for their country and live in co-operation with other Iraqis.

The Ba’ath Period (1968–2003)

After the coup d'état of the 17th July 1968, which brought the Ba'ath party to power in Iraq, efforts were made to end the Kurdish rebellion in the north-east of the country. Generous incentives were presented to the Kurdish rebel leader, Mullah Mustafa Barzani, by the Ba'ath regime in 1970 to put an end to his rebellion by offering him an autonomous Kurdish region with Erbil city (another Turkmen city) as its capital. In doing this, the Iraqi government acted in total disregard of the Turkmen interests in Iraq and particularly of those of the 300,000 unfortunate Turkmen of Erbil, who were sacrificed by the Ba'ath regime and offered as a ‘present’ to Mullah Mustafa Barzani in return for his acceptance to end the Kurdish rebellion.

In the 1970s, as it became more and more clear that Mullah Mustafa Barzani's ambitions and plans were to take over Kirkuk, control its oil wealth and declare an independent Kurdish state, the Iraqi government (Ba'ath regime) acted to maintain Iraq's territorial unity and to counter Barzani's ambitions. However, the Iraqi government refused to accede to the Kurdish rebels’ demands to include the Turkmen city of Kirkuk as part of the Kurdish autonomous region for economical and political reasons and because the overwhelming majority of the population in Kirkuk were Turkmen. Moreover, Saddam Hussein’s government did not carry out the agreement of 1970; thus, the Kurdish rebels renewed their fight against the central government in Baghdad.

Nevertheless, the Ba’ath party period commencing in 1968 had opened one of the darkest chapters in Turkmen history. The Turkmen Cultural Directorate that was originally set up by the government to bring Turkmen under strict control was not working according to the government’s plans. Thus, Saddam Hussein’s regime started a new policy, which is commonly referred to as Arabisation (‘ta’rib’), invoked by the Iraqi government programme. Arab families were resettled from southern Iraq to replace and dilute the Turkmen population but the Turkmen opposed policies of the Ba'ath regime and vigorously contested the regime's authoritarian Arabisation policy.

By 1972, the Iraqi government prohibited both the study of the Turkmen language and Turkmen media, and in 1973 any reference to the Turkmen was omitted from the provisional constitution. During the 1980s, the regime, the Ba’ath Party, prohibited even public use of the Turkmen language and the constitution of 1990 only states that the ‘people of Iraq’ consist of ‘Arabs and Kurds’.

As I have stated, to reduce the concentration of the Turkmen population in Turkmeneli regions in general, and Kirkuk in particular, the Iraqi government established an Arabisation policy, which can be defined as the systematic forcible transfer of the Turkmen and Kurdish populations, aimed at changing the demographic nature of northern Iraq. Arab families who were brought from southern Iraq to replace and dilute the Turkmen and Kurd populations was carried out under the Iraqi government programme of Arabisation.

The forced and arbitrary transfer of populations is not permissible under international law and is a crime against humanity. Nevertheless, Saddam Hussein’s government sought to alter the demographic make-up of northern Iraq in order to reduce the political power and presence of Turkmen and Kurds and to consolidate control over this oil-rich region; this covered areas reaching from the town of Mandeli, close to the Iranian border, to the Syrian and Turkish border areas around Telafer.

Many Turkmen and Kurdish villages were bulldozed and new Arab settlements were built nearby. The main object of the Arabisation policy was to reduce the Turkmen population in Kirkuk and the surrounding regions. Therefore, the Iraqi government annexed the district of Tuz Khormatu, which was linked to Kirkuk city until 1970. Because of the Arabisation policy, the Ba’ath regime decided to link it to a newly established province, called Saladdin (Tikrit), which is 130 km from Kirkuk, whereas Tuz Khormatu is 75 km from Kirkuk. Nevertheless, the district of Tuz Khormatu city was annexed to the Salahaddin province by an official government legislation number 434, which was issued on 11th September 1989. 3 In addition, the Ba’ath regime linked the Kifri district to the Diyala province. The Turkmen district of Altun Kopri, which was annexed from Erbil, governed the Kirkuk province; thus the area that Kirkuk governed was reduced from 19,543 km2 to 9,426 km2, becoming the fourth largest province in Iraq.

The properties and most other assets seized from the Turkmen victims were distributed among the new Arab arrivals as part of a package of economic incentives. Simultaneously, the Iraqi government brought in landless Arabs from the nearby Al-Jazeera desert in Northern Iraq and others from central and southern Iraq to settle in the Turkmen area. Furthermore, titles for the rich agricultural lands seized from the Kurds and Turkmen were invalidated upon their expulsion and the land was then leased under annual contracts to Arab farmers. Many of those expelled have, for over a decade, been living in camps for the internally displaced in the northern Kurdish-controlled governorates outside Iraq.

The forced mass displacement of populations based on their ethnic identity and attempts to Arabise Kirkuk and Tuz Khormatu date back to the discovery of major oil reserves in Kirkuk city in the 1920s, while Iraq was still under British mandate. Oil from the Kirkuk fields was not successfully extracted until 1927, but oil rights were first conceded to the Iraqi Petroleum Company consortium on 14th March 1925.

The Arabisation policy first occurred on a massive scale in the second half of the 1970s. During the Arabisation period, Saddam Hussein’s government controlled the oil industry. In addition, the Ba’ath regime brought in large numbers of Arab workers instead of employing local Turkmen and Kurds in the Iraqi Petroleum Company. The Turkmen were also excluded when the Iraqi government embarked on massive irrigation projects that began in the 1930s on the Hawija, Qaraj and Qari-Teppa plains around Kirkuk, which became a rich agricultural region. Later projects helped the Iraqi government to settle several large nomadic Arab tribes from southern Iraq on these newly fertile lands.

The Provisional Constitution of 1970

The provisional constitution announced by the President of Iraq, General Ahmed Hassan Bakir, on 24th January 1970, Article 5, stated that the people of Iraq consisted of two groups: Arabs and Kurds. The national and the legal rights of all ethnic minorities were acknowledged within the unity of Iraq. The cultural rights seemed to be set to include the cultural rights of the minorities in Iraq. In this declaration, the section of the Turkmen rights indicated that:

- The Turkmen shall receive primary education in Turkish in the area where they live and the Turkmen language will be the medium of instruction at the primary education stage.

- A directorate of Turkmen education shall be established and attached to the Ministry of Culture and Information.

- Turkmen publications shall be encouraged and assisted and this shall be attached to a union of Iraqi writers.

- A weekly newspaper and a monthly magazine in the Turkish language shall be published.

- The number of Turkmen programmes in the Turkmen language on Kirkuk TV shall be increased.

In 1972, at the height of the Cold War, Iraq signed a 15-year treaty with the Soviet Union. Saddam Hussein’s regime undertook wide-ranging social and economic reforms to try to increase its popularity. By March 1970, an agreement was reached between the government and the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) over the establishment of an autonomous Kurdish area. The government also nationalised the Iraqi Petroleum Company, which had been set up under the British administration and was pumping cheap oil to the West.

Soaring oil revenues resulting from the 1973 oil crisis were invested in industry, education and healthcare, raising Iraq’s standard of living to one of the highest in the Arab world. But Saddam Hussein’s government did not carry out the agreement of 1970; thus, a conflict broke out between the Kurds and the government’s armed forces in the spring of 1974.

The Kurds in the north of Iraq, who were funded by the US-backed Shah of Iran, Mohammed Riza Pahlavi, rebelled against the central government in Baghdad. The intensity of the conflict and the economic damage caused to the Iraqi economy pushed Baghdad to the negotiating table with Iran, in a famous agreement that was signed between the Shah and Saddam Hussein in Algeria, where Iraq agreed to share control of the disputed Sha’tt al-Arab waterway with Iran. The Shah of Iran, Mohammed Riza Pahlavi cut off the Kurds’ funds and the Iraqi regime put down their uprising. Also, Saddam Hussein extended his grip on power, stationing relatives and allies in key government and business roles. In 1978, the Ba’ath regime passed a new law, under which membership of opposition parties became punishable by death. The following year, Saddam Hussein forced General Ahmed Hassan Bakir’s resignation – officially, because of ill health – and assumed the presidency. He executed dozens of his rivals within days of taking power.

The National Congress of the Ba'ath Party in 1971

The national Congress of the Ba’ath Party, held in 1971, reached a decision to make Kirkuk city and the surrounding area an Arab city by the 1980s. In accordance with this decision, the following measures were taken:

All education in Iraq was entirely in the Arabic language. The schools providing education in the Turkmen language were closed down in phases. The names of the Turkmen schools were changed to Arabic names and Arabic education became compulsory in all Turkmen-populated areas. The teachers of these schools were appointed to other areas against their wishes. All these steps were taken by the Ba’ath regime to assimilate the Turkmen in the area and to prevent their cultural development.

There were 137 schools in 1970 and by 1971 this figure had fallen to 68. The decomposition of Iraqi Turkmen was an Iraqi policy passed down from one government to the next. This involved moving the Turkmen from the north to the south of Iraq and spreading them all over the country to decompose their national identity. In short, the Turkmen received almost no attention from the Western media, despite being the third largest demographic component of Iraq. From 1970, the Iraqi Government resorted to various means to assimilate the Turkmen and to ‘Arabise’ the region. For example, tens of thousands of Turkmen families were deported against their will into the south of Iraq and hundreds of Turkmen villages were destroyed by the Iraqi regime under a variety of pretexts. Simultaneously, the Iraqi government brought in landless Arabs from southern Iraq and other parts of Iraq to be settled in their place, enticing them with free housing and other economic incentives. This Arabisation policy was aimed at bringing about demographic changes designed to reduce the political power and presence of Turkmen, thereby consolidating the government’s control over this region.

Teachers were transferred to the south of Iraq and a variety of legislation was introduced by the Revolutionary Command Council to prevent the Turkmen from seeking any employment in Turkmen-populated areas, especially Kirkuk City. Turkmen leaders and elders were often falsely accused of spying for Turkey or Iran, or accused of being members of illegal organisations.

All these steps were carried out intentionally, in order to change the demography of the Turkmen-populated area. The Arabisation of Turkmen became a state policy in 1971, when the General Assembly of the Ba’ath Party decided to Arabise Kirkuk. This policy continued until 1980.

Administrative boundaries were changed in 1974 to divide Turkmen concentrations. Since the mid 1970s, Arabs have enjoyed special incentives and rights, encouraging them to move to historically Turkmen areas, including particularly the oil-rich cities of Kirkuk and Mosul.

Turkmen societies, institutions and properties were officially ‘Arabised’. This meant that the Iraqi administration not only prohibited the people from speaking Turkish in public but also punished even those who spoke privately in that language. Many Turkmen-settlement names were changed to Arabic by the Iraqi regime. Kirkuk City was officially changed to Al-Tamim (literally: ‘nationalisation’, marking the nationalisation of the Western-owned Iraq Petroleum Company in 1972) by resolution number 41 of the Council of the Revolutionary Command, dated 29th January 1976. The largest township therein, Tuz Khormatu, was administratively attached to Tikrit, which was the place of birth of Saddam Hussein.

The province of Kirkuk has continually shrunk in size with successive administrative decrees and thus the size of Kirkuk province, which was 20,000 square kilometres in 1975, reduced down to half that figure. Consequently, Kirkuk, with 4.2% of the land area and formerly the fourth largest province of Iraq, is now presently only the 14th largest province, with only 2% of land area. The Turkmen names of all the streets, shops, supermarkets, mosques, graveyards, parks, sports centres and entertainment centres were changed to Arabic names.

The towns of Tuz Khormatu, Kifri and Chamchamal were affiliated to neighbouring provinces. Elsewhere, in the oil-rich regions, the government had already resorted to re-drawing Iraq’s administrative map in an effort to alter the demographic make-up of disputed areas once and for all. The boundaries of Kirkuk province were redrawn such that an Arab majority was ensured in key areas. Several major towns with a clear Kurdish majority were reallocated to existing neighbouring provinces or to the newly created Salahuddin province.

The authorities then embarked on a massive campaign of forced relocation: tens of thousands of residents were evicted from their homes in areas with significant oil deposits, as well as in disputed areas. These included Kirkuk, Khaniqin, Mandeli and Shaikhan, where the majority of deportees were removed to locations in southern Iraq; many were abandoned without any shelter. Others were housed in rudimentary camps along major routes under military control. In their place came Arab families from various southern tribes, encouraged by the government with financial remuneration and other benefits.

Many Turkmen quarters’ towns and villages were changed and replaced with Arabic names in accordance with a decision taken by the Iraqi Ministry of Interior, on 20th of May, 1976, to rename Turkish villages with Arabic names. In accordance with the directives given by the Revolutionary Command Council in 1985, the party authorities contacted the eldest people of the Turkmen tribe and informed them about the new Arabic surnames that they were to use. The authorities prepared false lineage registers and replaced the Turkmen names with Arabic ones. These pressures were also being implemented in educational and cultural fields. The names of some of the Turkmen schools were changed and Arabic names were assigned in accordance with the plan of assimilating the Turkmen amongst the Arabs.

As in the other Arabised areas, the Iraqi government replaced the expelled Kurdish and Turkmen populations of Kirkuk with Arabs, most of them Shi`aa families brought from the south. Arabs took over the homes of expelled Kurdish and Turkmen families. The Iraqi government also constructed entirely new Arab neighbourhoods, such as al-Nasr, al-Hurriya and al-Qadisiyya, to alter drastically the ethnic demographics of Kirkuk — the very aim of Arabisation. The Arabs who came to Kirkuk tended to be more urbanised, middle-class professionals than the Arab farmers who settled in rural villages. In addition, the Iraqi government offered the newly arrived Arabs a free plot of land and 10,000 Dinars as an incentive.

To reduce the potential power and the influence of Turkmen in Kirkuk and the surrounding region, only the Arabs were selected for employment in a new workshop set up in Kirkuk. None of the Turkmen who had applied for employment were accepted. It was most unfair that there was not one single Turkmen employed in Kirkuk City among the 750 officials who were appointed to the municipality of Kirkuk. Previously, 80% of the employees were Turkmen. This shows the discrimination of the Iraqi government against the Turkmen. Furthermore, Saddam Hussein’s regime produced various legislations to change the demography of the area.

They wanted to dilute the concentration of Turkmen within the Arab society. One law that was passed decreed that Turkmen graduates in general, but particularly those who had graduated from Turkish universities, were not to be employed in Kirkuk and the surrounding areas. The Iraqi government discouraged the Iraqi Turkmen from taking higher education in Turkey by endorsing stamps on the Turkmen ethnic passport stating that the holder of the passport could travel to all countries except Israel and Turkey. Moreover, the Iraqi government utilised a variety of methods to prevent Turkmen families from forwarding any financial support to their children who were studying in Turkish universities.

Turkmen in Kirkuk were forbidden from possessing and operating a petrol station in Kirkuk and the surrounding areas. Moreover, Turkmen were forbidden from making export or import bids. Arabised policy was included by placing restrictions on employment and transfer of government employees to posts outside the Turkmen region.

The Ba’ath regime issued legislation that stipulated that Turkmen were prohibited from working in important governmental jobs and positions, for example in the secret service and police, as pilots in the air force, officers in the army, or as ministers and councillors. Turkmen civil servants were assigned to the south and banned from living in Turkmeneli.

The Turkmen employees and their families were forcibly transferred from the government offices in Kirkuk to other government organisations and especially to the South of Iraq. Also, to change the demography of Kirkuk City and to reduce the political influence of the Turkmen in Northern Iraq in general, and particularly in Kirkuk, the Iraqi government adopted various laws to transfer the Turkmen without their consent into various purpose-built settlements in the south of Iraq. These settlements were built by the Iraqi government and under the direct instruction of Saddam Hussein.

The Ba’ath Party administration had formed the most tragic days for the Turkmen nation. The tyrannical regime of Saddam had committed inhuman acts of violence in order to silence the Turkmen. The Turkmen nation was oppressed and persecuted and their leaders were fabricated with false accusations and executed, although they were not guilty.

Tens of thousands of the Turkmen’s political activists and ordinary citizens were subjected to arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, summary execution, torture by beating and burning, electric shock, starvation, mutilation and rape. The wives of Turkmen prisoners were tortured in front of their husbands and children were tortured in the presence of their parents, the horrors of which were concealed from the world by the apparatus of a totalitarian state.

Because of a strike that was carried out by Turkmen students in conjunction with the Turkmen teaching union on the 2nd January, 1971, Saddam Hussein’s government reduced the number of Turkmen schools that were to be open in Turkmen-populated areas and also arrested Turkmen union members. These were interrogated by the Directorate of Security of Kirkuk, which at that time was run by Mr Taha Al-Jazrawi. In addition, the Ba’ath regime found a good opportunity in the Turkmen student strike to arrest and execution of a prominent Turkmen actor Hussein Ali Moussa Demerci. By 1972, the Iraqi government had issued new legislation prohibiting the study of Turkmen languages in Turkmen schools. They also banned Turkmen publicity and media.

The Ba’ath regime, under a variety of pretexts, demolished the houses of Turkmen-populated areas in Kirkuk City, in addition to a large number of Turkmen villages demolished by the Iraqi government. For example, Turkmen houses in Tuz Khormatu, Beshir, Kombetler and Yaychi were destroyed and the residents of those villages were left homeless. Moreover, a large number of Turkmen houses were confiscated, in order to split up the Turkmen localities. Arab families were brought to Kirkuk from the south of Iraq and resettled by force, with the financial support of the government, in order to change the demography of the area. Turkmen who wanted to purchase or sell properties in Kirkuk were held under obligation to obtain official permission from governmental authorities. Under resolution number 1081, dated 27th September, 1984, the Turkmen lands were expropriated and allotted to the Arabs who were brought from the south. There was a very strict ban on all sales of real estate in Turkmen regions. Turkmen could only sell their land or buildings to Arabs. Turkmen could neither obtain building permission on their own lands nor purchase real estate.

Religious leaders who did not speak Arabic were forced to deliver sermons in Arabic, and when they failed to, they were imprisoned. The 1980s saw the execution of countless Turkmen leaders and elders who were often falsely accused of spying for Iran or being pro-Turkey. During the Iran–Iraq war, dozens of Turkmen villages were totally bulldozed to the ground. Turkmen were severely intimidated into silence during the 1987 national census in Iraq, as it was relevant to the number of ethnic groups in the country. In this census, Turkmen were openly threatened to declare themselves as either Arabs or Kurds. If they declared themselves Turkmens, they would be deported to the Saudi border and to the south of Iraq.

The Iraq and Iran War 1980–1988 (The First Gulf War)

One of the Turkmen’s most painful tragedies unfolded during the Iran–Iraq war (1980 to 1988). While tens of thousands of young Turkmen were enrolled and all Turkmen reservists were called back to serve in the Iraqi army to fight against the Iranians, their families in Turkmeneli were discriminated against. Thousands of them were forcibly displaced and their property was confiscated under the pretext that they were opposing the war and were members of the outlawed ‘Da'wa’ political party!

The Iraqi government (Ba’ath regime) used the Turkmen as a scapegoat during the Iraq–Iran War (the ‘First Gulf War’). Whereas Arabs and, especially members of the Ba’ath Party, were stationed in safe places, providing planning and logistical support, the Ba’ath regime deliberately brought the Turkmen to the front line during the Gulf war and during the liberation of Kuwait. Because of these wars, thousands of Iraqi Turkmen lost their lives – they were either killed in battle or went missing in action. The Iraqi Turkmen suffered severely under the dictatorship of the Socialist Arab Ba’ath Party, whereas the Kurds were exempt from carrying out military services.

Moreover, the 1980s saw the execution of countless Turkmen leaders and elders who were often falsely accused of spying for Turkey or Iran. During the Iran–Iraq war, Turkmen were not allowed to establish any political party or to form any political or cultural organisation. The only party that was allowed to function in Iraq was the Ba’ath party.

The official combination of the assimilation policy and the decomposition policy against the Turkmen by Saddam Hussein’s regime successfully played out for years, but assimilation and decomposition would not have been enough to erase or eradicate the Turkish character and the language of the Iraqi Turkmen.

The repressive policies of Iraqi governments were always the order of the day; for fear that the Iraqi Turkmen could be as big a headache as the Iraqi Kurds and the Shi’aa Arabs in the South. Repressive measures by the Ba’ath regime were intensified or relaxed depending on the opinions and the relations of the Iraqi government, especially with the Iraqi Kurds. Moreover, in the interim constitution year, 1973, no reference was made to the Turkmen population in Iraq. The Ba’ath regime prohibited public use of the Turkish language in 1980, and the new constitution of 1990 only states that the Iraqi people consist of Arabs and Kurds.

The uprising of 1991

During the Gulf war in 1991, an operation known as ‘Provide Comfort’ was launched by the allied forces to ensure a safe haven through an air exclusion zone, which prohibited Iraqi aircraft from flying north of the 36th parallel.

This safe haven caused the division of the Turkmen into separate communities in the Kurdish autonomous area and under the Iraqi administration. During this period, the Kurdish political party enjoyed unprecedented autonomy in administering their political affairs.

However, the treatment of the Turkmen under their control illustrates a pattern of systematic human rights violation. Almost immediately after Iraq accepted the cease-fire on 3rd March, 1991, uprisings began to spread from dissident areas in the north and south of the country. The Shi’aa in Basra City and the Najaf and Karbala in southern Iraq took to the streets in protest against the regime. During the uprising, Sulyaimaniya City, which is a Kurdish-populated area in the north of Iraq, was the first large city to fall. Within a week, the Kurds controlled the Kurdish Autonomous Region and the nearby city of Kirkuk. In mid-February, President George Bush (Snr.) called on the Iraqi people and the military to take matters into their own hands. Despite this call to arms, promised US support never arrived but, instead, Iraqi helicopter gunships arrived to quell the uprising.
Civilians and suspected activists in the revolt were arrested by the Iraqi armed forces and were executed en masse; moreover, hospitals, schools, mosques, shrines and columns of escaping refugees were bombed and shelled.

According to US intelligence, between 30,000 and 60,000 people were killed by Saddam Hussein’s military. The Turkmen people took the lion’s share of this atrocity in Altun Kopri, Tuz Khormatu and Kirkuk.

Altun Kopri is a small Turkmen town located 40 km north of the Turkmen city of Kirkuk and the name means ‘Golden Bridge’ in the Turkmen language. The indigenous inhabitants of Altun Kopri are Turkmen, but in recent years, a large number of Kurds migrated to this town seeking work as economical migrants, especially after the Kurdish rebels in 1975 were suppressed by the Iraqi regime.

During the uprising in March 1991 against the Iraqi regime, the inhabitants of Altun Kopri decided to leave the town after they had heard that Kirkuk City was retaken by the Iraqi regime and that looting, burning property and summary execution were taking place. With the news of the summary executions, opposition to the Iraqi regime quickly spread to Altun Kopri. To avoid reprisal, persecution and revenge from the Iraqi secret service and republican guards, the inhabitants of the town decided to escape and shelter in safe areas. The fleeing population from Altun Kopri were ambushed and rounded up by the Iraqi army and the consequence was that all males were separated from females and the Iraqi armed forces and Iraqi secret service executed hundreds of Iraqi Turkmen and Kurds on the spot. It was two weeks after this despicable crime against the civilian people before the dead bodies were allowed to be removed and buried by their families. The Iraqi government then confiscated the properties of these martyrs. The dead were buried in a mass grave in Altun Kopri.

In the meantime, during 1991, the people in Tuz Khormatu also rose up against the Ba’ath regime. The consequence of this uprising was the occupation of the city of Tuz Khormatu by the Kurdish militia for a short period. During the occupation of Tuz Khormatu by the Kurds, the Turkmen carried arms and fought vigorously against Saddam’s army alongside the Kurdish rebels. However, the Turkmen paid a very high price for their participation in the uprising when the Kurdish leadership made a secret deal with the Iraqi government (Ba’ath regime) by withdrawing their forces from Tuz Khormatu so as not to be attacked by the Iraqi armed forces. The deal between the Kurds and the Ba’ath regime was carried out secretly and without the knowledge of the Turkmen, and this led to the Kurdish militia withdrawing from the city of Tuz Khormatu in the middle of the night, leaving the Turkmen to suffer the consequences. After the Kurdish militia withdrew from Tuz Khormatu, the Iraqi army entered the city but they faced a vicious resistance and a street war commenced in the district.

The fighting between the opposition and government forces lasted for several hours and some of the opposition fighters withdrew their limited resources and headed to the mountains surrounding Tuz Khormatu, while the remaining fighters melted away into the city’s houses. While the fighters headed towards the mountains, they were attacked by military helicopters. In the meantime, the Iraqi army and security forces entered the district of Tuz Khormatu and large numbers of fighters were arrested and executed on the spot by Iraqi security forces under the pretext of helping the Kurdish rebels or fighting against the Iraqi government.

The Turkmen people in Tuz Khormatu suffered from neglect and persecution through ethnic and sectarian division by the former totalitarian regime, which itself had executed hundreds of young people and imprisoned many of its children in the early 1980s.

Nevertheless, as part of the Iraqi government’s regime of legalising its ethnic cleansing policies, on 6th of September 2001, in an unprecedented move, it passed resolution number 199, giving all non-Arab Iraqis over 18 the right to change their ethnic identity to that of Arab. Such legislation is contrary to all the principles of human rights and was politically motivated. The Ba’ath council banned Turkmen from acquiring real estate in Kirkuk, with its resolution number 434, dated 11th September 1989 and its resolution number 418, dated 8 April 1984. Turkmen who owned arable land were deported to the southern regions by force. In the 1987 national census in Iraq, Turkmen were openly threatened to declare themselves as either Arabs or Kurds. If they declared themselves Turks, they would be deported to South Iraq.

Notes

1 Turkmen The Iraqi Turkmen live in an area that they call "Turkmenia" in Latin or "Turkmeneli" which means, "Land of the Turkmen". It was referred to as "Turcomania" by the British geographer William Guthrie in 1785. The Turkmen are Turkic groups that have a unique heritage and culture as well as linguistic, historical and cultural links with the surrounding Turkic groups such as those in Turkey and Azerbaijan. Their spoken language is closer to Azeri but their official written language is like the Turkish spoken in present-day Turkey. Their real population has always being suppressed by the authorities in Iraq for political reasons and estimated at 2%, whereas in reality their numbers are more realistically between 2.5 to 3 million, i .e. 12% of the Iraqi population.

2 Turkmeneli is a diagonal strip of land stretching from the Syrian and Turkish border areas from around Telafer in the north of Iraq, reaching down to the town of Mandeli on the Iranian border in Central Iraq. The Turkmen of Iraq settled in Turkmeneli in three successive and constant migrations from Central Asia, which increased their numbers and enabled them to establish six states in Iraq.

3 Aziz Kadir Samanci, Political History for the Iraqi Turkmen, Page 34, first edition, year 1999 - Published by Dar Al-Alsaqi, London, United Kingdom.

4 Ibid page 34

N.B.
Mofak Salman Kerkuklu can be contacted here: msalman@eircom.net

Note
Picture: Map of Turkmeneli (Iraqi Turkmenia – blue), and the zones of influence of the loathed and unrepresentative militias of the pseudo-Kurdish thugs Talabani (in orange) and Barzani (in pink).