Iraq threatens flight ban after Kurdish independence vote
● Turkey and Iran fear poll will embolden Kurdish populations
Iraq’s prime minister has ordered the northern Kurdish region to hand over control of its airports to federal authorities or face a flight ban, signalling a tough response to a landmark Kurdish independence referendum.
The Iraqi Kurdish leadership billed Monday’s vote as an exercise in self-determination, but the Iraqi government is strongly opposed to any redrawing of its borders. Meanwhile, Turkey and Iran fear the move will embolden their own country’s Kurdish populations.
Prime minister Haider alabadi’s ultimatum came the day after the vote and ahead of the release of official results. He said the ban would exclude humanitarian and other “urgent” flights.
“The vote was a historic and strategic mistake by the Kurdish leadership,” Mr Abadi said “I will not give up on the unity of Iraq – that is my national and constitutional duty.”
Regional authorities in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish north put the turnout at above 70 per cent, but many voters reported irregularities, including cases of individuals voting multiple times and without proper registration.
Many expect a resounding Yes vote when the official results are released, most likely today, according to the Kurdish electoral commission.
For decades, Kurdish politics have hinged on dreams of an independent state. When colonial powers redrew the map of the Middle East after the First World War, the Kurds – who now number around 30 million – were divided among Turkey, Iran, Syria and Iraq.
After polls closed in Iraq’s Kurdish region on Monday night, the skies above the city of Irbil filled with fireworks, and families flocked to the centre of town to celebrate. Across the border thousands of Iranian Kurds held rallies in support.
The vote has already ramped up regional tensions.
Iraqi troops began joint military exercises with Turkey along the border. Fearing the vote could be used to redraw Iraq’s borders and take a sizeable part of the country’s oil wealth with it, Mr Abadi has called the referendum an act of “sedition” that “escalated the ethnic and sectarian tension” across the country.
In Iran, thousands of Kurds poured into the streets in the cities of Baneh, Saghez and Sanandaj on Monday night. Footage shared online by Iranian Kurds showed demonstrators waving lit mobile phones in the air and chanting their support. Some footage also showed Iranian police officers assembling nearby or watching the demonstrators.
Iranian state television yesterday acknowledged the rallies, a rarity for the Islamic Republic.
Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and its regular army have been running military exercises near the border with Iraq’s Kurdish region in a sign of Tehran’s displeasure at the Kurdish referendum.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan reiterated yesterday that his country was considering all options, ranging from military intervention to economic sanctions against Iraq’s Kurdish region.
Mr Erdogan said, however, that he hopes the Iraqi Kurdish leadership will abandon aims of creating a separate state.