Kurdish president warns of backlash
Aggression by Iraq cited after region OKs independence.
IRBIL, IRAQ — The president of Iraq’s Kurdish region warned Friday that the Kurds might be forced to retaliate if the central government persists with what his spokesman called a “very aggressive” stance toward the pro-independence referendum.
O v e r s e a s f l i g h t s we r e canceled Friday from the international airport in Irbil, hours before a ban by the Iraqi government took effect, while officials in Baghdad warned that land borders might also be closed. There were also reports of some internal highway closures.
“We a r e h o p e f u l t h a t these are all temporary measures,” said Vahal Ali, director of communications in the office of Massoud Barzani, the Kurdish region’s president. “We want this to be a peaceful transition, but if Baghdad decides not, there is a lot we can also do.”
Ali was critical of threats by Baghdad to ask Turkey to cut a vital oil pipeline, which provides most of the estimated $8 billion the Kurdish region earns annually from oil revenues, and a request from the Iraqi parliament to move troops into the oil-rich, Kurdish-held city of Kirkuk.
“Baghdad’s response to the referendum was very aggressive, so we don’t know what will happen,” the spokesman said.
Iraqi Kurds overwhelmingly voted in favor of independence in a referendum Mon d ay, wh i c h A l i s a i d obliges Barzani to negotiate independence from the rest of Iraq. Baghdad has refused to enter such nego- tiations, and Ali said that if it maintains that attitude, Kurdistan will be forced to unilaterally declare independence.
“President Barzani was obligated to conduct the referendum and now is obligated to re spond to that re s ul t , ” Al i s a i d. “We’ve repeatedly said we can negotiate, but that has to be on the question of independence.”
Ku rd i s h o f f i c i a l s h ave expressed di smay at the lack of support they have found internationally, with the United States and other powers, as well as the United Nations, critical of the decision to even hold the referendum and none expressing approval for the pro-independence result.
H o s h y a r Z e b a r i , wh o helped lead the referendum drive in the Kurdish region and was formerly Iraq’s foreign minister, said that criticism of the vote from the United States had “emboldened Baghdad” to take a hard-line position toward the Kurds. Baghdad’s threatened re t a l i at i on was, he said, “very damaging and provocative, and illogical and destructive.”
Ali said the Kurds were hopeful that international allies would eventually come around to the idea of Kurdish independence and said they were heartened at some individual voices praising the referendum result.
He cited, for instance, U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, the Senate minority l e a d e r, who Wedne s d ay praised the Kurdish independence vote.
Iraq’s influential Shia spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali al Sistani, in his Friday sermon in the southern city of Karbala was strongly critical of the Kurdish move.
“A ny i n d i v i d u a l s t e p s toward division and sepa- ration and the attempt of making this thing reality will lead to internal and external reaction and bad consequences that would damage our dear Kurdish citizens in the first place and maybe lead to what is more dangerous than that, God forbid, and will give way for many regional and international sides to intervene in Iraqi affairs,” Sistani said.
On Friday, military officials in Baghdad confirmed that the strategic highway linking Mosul and the northern city of Dohuk, in Kurdish-held territory, was closed by the Iraqi military for several hours.
In addition, protests by civilians forced the closure of the Kirkuk-Baghdad highway Friday. Saad al-Hadithi, the spokesman for Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi of Iraq, said land borders would also be closed between Iraq’s Kurdish region and Turkey and Iran, but there was no confirmation if the blockade had been put in place.
The Iraq border agency announced that it was sending convoys of police officers and Interior Ministry officials to guard three key land border crossings between the Kurdish region and Syria, Turkey and Iran beginning today.
Ali said that he was aware of no such move and that it would be unconstitutional.
He said that cutting off the Kurdish region’s trade with Turkey, which totals $17 billion a year, would hurt everyone. He also warned of measures that the Kurdish regional government could take if Iraq’s crackdown on air travel and the borders continued, including severing internet and mobile telephone coverage, much of it based in the region, and even the supply of cement, most of which comes from the region.