Kirkuk's jubilant Kurds fill polling stations for independence vote

[Solomon2]

SEPTEMBER 25, 2017 / 9:38 AM / UPDATED 2 HOURS AGO
Kirkuk's jubilant Kurds fill polling stations for independence vote

Reuters Staff

5 MIN READ

* Kurds in traditional dress sing and dance at polling stations

* Opposition to vote simmers among Arabs and Turkmen in Kirkuk

* Arab, Turkmen areas appeared to have lower voter turnout

By Raya Jalabi

KIRKUK, Iraq Sept 25 (Reuters) - Singing and dancing and draped with Kurdish flags, Kirkuk’s Kurds flocked to polling stations of the ethnically-mixed city on Monday to vote to be independent from Iraq.

Opposition to the vote has been simmering among the Arabs and Turkmen who live alongside the Kurds in the northern Iraqi city and there had been rumours that the vote would not take place in mixed areas.

Kurdistan Regional Government President Masoud Barzani’s decision to include it in the independence referendum, was widely seen as a move to consolidate Kurdish control there.

Voter turnout appeared to be much higher among Kurds in Kirkuk which both the central government of Baghdad and the semi-autonomous KRG think they should control.

The vote is expected to deliver a comfortable “yes” for independence, but is not binding. There have been international warnings that it could ignite more regional conflict.

At the Shorja polling station in a Kurdish neighbourhood, one of two that the media was allowed to photograph and freely observe, jubilant Kurds of all ages arrived to vote in traditional dress.


“Today is the birthday of Kurdistan,” said Abu Bakr, an older Kurdish man. “Today is a holiday, a festival.”

Men in grey or light brown trousers with matching vests wand women in long robes in vivid colours and headscarves, queued up at the crowded polling station. They showed off their ink-stained fingers, before heading outside to join the throng of people singing and dancing.

People brought their families, eager to include their children in a historic moment. A father handed his ballot to his infant daughter, who dropped it into the box herself.

“Independence is our dream and our right,” said Hajal Ahmed Hussein. “We deserve a happy life.”

BLACK FLAGS, EMPTY STREETS
On Sunday night, Governor Najmaddin Kareem spoke at a hastily organised press conference, to reassure the residents of his city that the voting would happen as planned.

This followed a feverish 24 hours of rumours that the voting would be halted in Kirkuk and the other ethnically mixed cities, towns and villages. The 244 ballot boxes were distributed around the city late on Sunday night, several days after they arrived.

At least one Kurd was killed in a pre-referendum clash, and tensions continue to run high.

Kareem called on voters of all ethnicities and religions in Kirkuk to vote, saying “Kirkuk’s future can only be decided by the people of Kirkuk.”

Nechirvan Barzani, KRG’s prime minister, said the Iraqi flag would continue to fly in Kirkuk after the referendum results.

However, polling stations across Arab and Turkmen areas in the city were far less crowded than in Kurdish areas. Normally bustling shopping districts in non-Kurdish areas were shuttered, storefronts locked and with barely anyone in sight.

In the Shi’ite Turkmen neighbourhood of Tis’een, the streets were largely empty, save a few black flags fluttering in the wind, marking the sombre month of Muharram observed by Shi’ite Muslims.

In nearby Kindi, another Turkmen neighbourhood, Kurdish electoral commission officials at one polling station told Reuters that 800 of its 3,018 registered voters had cast their ballots by midday, including “many” Arabs from the area abutting the Governorate building, known as Al Muhafatha.

But an Arab resident of the area said neither he, nor any of his neighbours voted on Monday.

“We want Kirkuk to stay one country, under one capital, Baghdad,” said Abu Dumour whose family were some of the original Arab residents of Kirkuk.

 

[Solomon2]

Kurdish independence referendum turnout 76 percent one hour before closing of station
Reuters Staff
1 MIN READ

A woman casts her vote during Kurds independence referendum in Kirkuk, Iraq. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) - Turnout in Iraqi Kurdistan’s independence referendum reached 76 percent at 5:00 p.m. (1400 GMT), one hour before the time set initially for polling stations to close, Erbil-based Rudaw TV said, citing the higher referendum commission.

Polling stations were supposed to close at 6:00 p.m but voting was still underway in several towns and cities of the Kurdish-held areas in northern Iraq where people were queuing, according to Rudaw.

'Today we will finally have our state': Iraqi Kurds vote in historic referendum on independence

Supporters wave flags and chant slogans inside the Erbil Stadium while waiting to hear Kurdish President Masoud Barzani speak CREDIT: GETTY

• Josie Ensor, erbil

25 SEPTEMBER 2017 • 4:58PM


“Today we will finally be a nation, just like the UK,” Khano Darwesh said as he showed off his ink-stained finger. “Our people have been fighting for more than 100 years for this moment.”

The 77-year-old joined more than three million other residents of Iraqi Kurdistan who went to the polls today for a historic referendum on independence.

Women came dressed in their finest, men wore traditional Kurdish gowns.

For some of the older votes, emotions got the better of them and they broke down in tears as they walked out of the voting booths in Kurdistan’s capital of Erbil.

For Mr Darwesh, who was not perturbed by the two hour-long queue, it was only the second time he had ever voted in his life. The last time being in Kurdistan’s 2005 local leadership elections.

Khano Darwesh, 77, votes in Erbil CREDIT: TELEGRAPH
“Nobody wanted this but here we are today,” he said, slamming his fist on his chest.

The polls closed at 6pm and while the result is expected within 72 hours, it is a foregone conclusion.

Iraqi Kurds have long dreamed of independence – something the Kurdish people were denied when colonial powers drew the map of the Middle East after the first world war.

But Monday's vote, called by Masoud Barzani, the president of Kurdistan, has been rejected by just about every world power.


Iraq has called it unconstitutional, with its parliament demanding on Monday that troops be sent to areas contested with the Kurds that were included in the referendum.

Turkey, unsettled at the prospect that the vote might provoke the separatist dreams of its own Kurdish minority, has threatened that Kurdistan will pay "a price" in the event of a yes vote.

The UK and US, which has allied with the Kurds in the fight against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) in northern Iraq, has urged Mr Barzani to delay, saying it will only distract from the fight against the jihadists.

Mr Darwesh, who for 45 years fought for independence with Kurdistan’s Peshmerga army, said he believed his people would not be safe until they had a state of their own.

“I have had my home taken from me four times in my life,” he said. “The first was taken by the Persians in Iran, the second was stolen by Saddam’s forces, the third was burnt down by them and the fourth was taken over by Arabs when the Iraqi army invade Erbil in the 1980s.

“Now no one will ever take my house again,” he said, tears welling in his eyes.


While popularity for Mr Barzani and his referendum runs high in Erbil, much fewer have appetite for it outside of the president’s heartland.

In oil-rich Kirkuk to the southeast, which was included in the vote despite being contested with Iraq, many have reservations.

“This is a political vote, not a popular vote. Holding it now, when things are so unsettled, is only asking for trouble,” said Sammi Hawrani, manager of Kirkuk’s football club.

According to analysts, guerilla leader-turned-politician Mr Barzani is using the referendum as leverage in his Kurdish Regional Government's (KRG) longstanding disputes with federal authorities in Baghdad over territory and oil exports.

“People are concerned about their vote as they fear it will lead to terrible consequences,” Kamal Chomani of the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy told the Telegraph.

“Some think the ones who have called for this referendum will either use the vote as a bargaining chip in Baghdad, or they will turn Kurdistan into a Saudi Arabia, where one family controls the resources and the power for generations.”

 

[T-123456]

They should kick the Turkmen and Arabs out of Kirkuk as they did in other cities,so that the fun can start.

'Today we will finally have our state'

Yes you will.

 

[lastofthepatriots]

They should kick the Turkmen and Arabs out of Kirkuk as they did in other cities,so that the fun can start.


Yes you will.

Don't be sour. Wish them well.

 

[Solomon2]

Iraqi Kurdish people carry the official Kurdish flag as they celebrate at a street in the ethnically-mixed city of Kirkuk northern Iraq, 25 September 2017.



Iraqi displaced people from Mosul, who were forced to flee their homes due the fighting between Iraqi forces and Islamic state group, vote at a polling station during Kurdistan independence referendum at Ahti-2 camp in Erbil, the capital of Kurdistan region, northern Iraq, 25 September 2017. The Kurdistan region is an autonomous region in northern Iraq since 1991, with an estimated population of 5.3 million people. The region share borders with Turkey, Iran, and Syria, all of which have large Kurdish minorities. On 25 September the Kurdistan region holds a referendum for independence and the creation of the state of Kurdistan amidst divided international support. EPA-EFE/GAILAN HAJI


Kurdish election and referendum committee staff members count the votes in the end of Kurdistan independence referendum, at a tally center in Erbil, northern Iraq, 25 September 2017.

 

[Fenasi Kerim]

They should kick the Turkmen and Arabs out of Kirkuk as they did in other cities,so that the fun can start.


Yes you will.

And they will, they will do it by making conditions worse for them and moving in a ton of Kurdish families into the city.

Our government can sit and wait for blood to be spilled while Kirkuk and Mosuls demographics are changed in the next 5 to 10 years.

 

[EgyptianAmerican]

At this point, they are just begging to be bombarded.

 

[Solomon2]

At this point, they are just begging to be bombarded.

Careful. The sixteenth-century Dutch were called Geuzen (beggars) by their despotic Spanish monarch. The Dutch adopted the label as their own during their hard-won eighty-year struggle for independence from Spain.

 

[T-123456]

And they will, they will do it by making conditions worse for them and moving in a ton of Kurdish families into the city.

Our government can sit and wait for blood to be spilled while Kirkuk and Mosuls demographics are changed in the next 5 to 10 years.

Mosul,Erbil Kerkuk have already been changed,90% of the Arabs and Turkmens were kicked out of these cities or killed and all thanks to our governments neglect.
Erdogan made the KRG to what it is now.

Careful. The sixteenth-century Dutch were called Geuzen (beggars) by their despotic Spanish monarch. The Dutch adopted the label as their own during their hard-won eighty-year struggle for independence from Spain.

You be careful,Iran just tested a 2000km missile,Israel is not that far anymore.

 

[Solomon2]

...You be careful,Iran just tested -

And what relevance is that to this thread? Zero, right?

 

[Muhammed45]

Careful. The sixteenth-century Dutch were called Geuzen (beggars) by their despotic Spanish monarch. The Dutch adopted the label as their own during their hard-won eighty-year struggle for independence from Spain.

This referendum is only backed by Barzani's Israeli brothers.
Even American hypocrite double crossers have asked them to postpone it. So there is no legitimacy in this non sense referendum in which Soleimanian Kurds are choked, Arabs and Turkimen have been murdered and displaced, Two major Kurdish groups have opposed it and many forged papers are getting thrown inside the box!
Only your kind is supporting this illegal referendum Zionist!

 

[T-123456]

And what relevance is that to this thread? Zero, right?

And what does opening this thread have to do with US or Israeli interest,Zero,nada,niente,nothing,right?

 

[AshishDelhi]

This referendum is only backed by Barzani's Israeli brothers.
Even American hypocrite double crossers have asked them to postpone it. So there is no legitimacy in this non sense referendum in which Soleimanian Kurds are choked, Arabs and Turkimen have been murdered and displaced, Two major Kurdish groups have opposed it and many forged papers are getting thrown inside the box!
Only your kind is supporting this illegal referendum Zionist!

Your heart bleeds for kashmiri Muslims and rohingya Muslims but not for kurd Muslims, why?

 

[Muhammed45]

Your heart bleeds for kashmiri Muslims and rohingya Muslims but not for kurd Muslims, why?

We are not going to bomb our Kurdish brothers, this military arrangement is to put Barzani on his place. As i said, Kurds in Soleimania in majority have opposed this referendum , not refuted, but asked Barzani to postpone it.
This is just weakening Iraq against DEASH terrorists and the guy knows that.
Majority of Kurdish Muslim hate Israel, Barzani is going to eat his own cr@p not Kurdish people.

 

[Solomon2]

This referendum is only backed by Barzani's Israeli brothers.

Netanyahu said something supportive of Kurdish independence but if he said something supporting this referendum then I missed it. Links, please.

Even American hypocrite double crossers have asked them to postpone it.

For the same reason U.S. opposed the break-up of the Soviet Union: because it might bring "instability". Both failures of imagination and ideals by the State Department.

So there is no legitimacy in this non sense referendum in which Soleimanian Kurds are choked, Arabs and Turkimen have been murdered and displaced -

Democratic legitimacy doesn't come from foreign diplomats and there is no record today of Arabs and Turkmen being "murdered and displaced."

Two major Kurdish groups have opposed it and many forged papers are getting thrown inside the box!

Links, please.

Only your kind is supporting this illegal referendum Zionist!

Do you also think that in 1971 West Pakistan should have accepted being ruled by Bengalis?