By Jennifer Thompson
While the world has been watching the conflict between Iraq and the US over the last two months, Turkey has quietly established a "security zone" as a permanent buffer against the militant Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on Iraqi territory. Arab disillusionment with the US administration's double standards on Iraq's compliance and Israel's non-compliance with UN resolutions has been increased by the US's tacit acceptance of Turkey's occupation of northern Iraq.
On September 25, a massive Turkish contingent invaded northern Iraq — South Kurdistan to its mainly Kurdish inhabitants — to support the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP). Around 30,000 Turkish soldiers and 1500 village guards crossed the Iraq border, supported by more than 150 tanks, armoured vehicles and Cobra helicopters, and F-16 bombers.
Turkey reportedly bombarded the border region for days as its troops were transported across the border into the UN-declared "safe area", set up to protect Iraqi Kurds from the Baghdad regime since 1991.
Heavy resistance as they attempted to move through the KDP-controlled areas bordering Turkey and Syria prompted the arrival of up to 20,000 special unit soldiers from other bases in North Kurdistan. The areas of Kurejahro and Metina were reportedly attacked with napalm, while splinter bombs were detonated over the areas of Sikefta Brindara, Metinan and the Kurmanc mountains.
Turkey also advanced into areas controlled by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), including the area near the border with Iran, where an oil pipeline is to be built. According to the Iraqi Broadcasting Corporation, Turkish tanks were spotted as far south as Shaqlawa and only 60 km from Kirkuk — their deepest incursion yet.
A UN document released on October 12 said the Turkish incursion had displaced about 10,000 Kurds, adding to the 90,000 displaced by Iraqi-Kurdish feuding in 1996.
Immediately following Turkey's invasion, the KDP declared that the PKK had one month to leave the area. The Turkish General Staff also declared that it wanted to wipe out the PKK's bases in the area before winter.
There are about 30 million Kurds spread through the region — 15 million in Turkey, 6 million in Iran, 4 million in Iraq, with others in Syria and the former Soviet Union. They have a long history of oppression by these governments.
The PKK in Turkey has been fighting a 13-year war for national self-determination, during which more than 2000 villages have been razed by the Turkish military and thousands of civilians killed. The European Court of Human Rights on November 28 again found Turkey guilty on charges of burning villages in the south-east.
US support for the Ankara regime's brutal war against the Kurds in south-east Turkey, including its regular incursions into Iraq, is nothing new. The US has never supported the Kurdish people's right to self-determination. US leaders have said they would prefer the Iraqi military to remain in control of Kurdish-inhabited northern Iraq; however, they also want a more pliant, pro-US Iraqi regime.
Following the end of the US-led war on Iraq in 1991, the Kurds in the north rose up against the Iraqi regime. After Baghdad brutally suppressed the uprisings, US troops set up "safe areas" in the north. At the same time, the Pentagon imposed no-fly zones in the north and south.
Within the "no-fly zones" — where there are minimal Iraqi troops and a ban on Iraqi military air activity, enforced by US warplanes based in Turkey — the US supervised the creation of a shaky alliance between the KDP and PUK to deny Baghdad control of the region.
But ambiguity over Iraqi sovereignty in the north is problematic for the US. It has a policy on the one hand of encouraging the rule of the KDP and PUK, which do not support an independent Kurdistan, and on the other of allowing Turkey and its collaborators a free hand to attack the PKK bases and Turkish-Kurd refugee camps that have sprung up in Baghdad's absence.
The fragile alliance between the two Iraqi-Kurdish conservative nationalist groups has been frequently interrupted by outbreaks of fighting, mainly over the division of informal tariffs and taxes on trade crossing into Turkey.
The KDP and PUK agreed on November 19 on a new cease-fire in northern Iraq, but the Turkish involvement is blocking western-backed peace efforts. Turkey has previously hosted negotiations as one of three NATO-member mediators. The PUK says resumption of the "Ankara peace process" sponsored by the US, Britain and Turkey is impossible in its present form.
Turkish deputy Prime Minister, Bulent Ecevit, while favouring Iraqi territorial integrity, has promoted the idea of a Turkish "security zone" on Iraqi soil. The buffer zone has never been officially confirmed by Ankara, but electronic surveillance equipment has been deployed in the mountains and "border posts" have been staffed jointly by Turkish troops and the KDP.