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Limit action by kurds { February 27 2003 }

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   http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10034-2003Feb27.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10034-2003Feb27.html

U.S. Would Limit Action By Kurds in Postwar Iraq
Vow to Turkey Is Part of Deal on Troops

By Philip P. Pan and Daniel Williams
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, February 27, 2003; 8:07 AM

ANKARA, Turkey, Feb. 26 -- The United States has promised to prevent Kurds from imposing a federation-style government in postwar Iraq that would ensure their continued autonomy and agreed to allow Turkish troops to enter northern Iraq and observe the disarmament of Kurdish militias once fighting has stopped, Turkish officials said today.

The deal, designed to persuade Turkey to allow U.S. troops to use its bases for an attack on Iraq, foresees that Turkish troops will cross the 218-mile Turkish-Iraqi border along with U.S. troops and proceed at least 121/2 miles into the rugged Kurdish-inhabited hills to prevent a flow of refugees into Turkey and maintain stability and security in the region, the officials said.

Turkish officials said they requested the guarantees, as a condition for opening their territory to U.S. forces, to ensure that an independent Kurdish state -- or even an autonomous Kurdish entity within an Iraqi federation -- does not emerge along Turkey's borders if a widely expected U.S. attack destroys President Saddam Hussein's central government. U.S. and Turkish negotiators reached consensus today on almost all details of the deal, officials from both sides said, and the Turkish government said a parliamentary vote -- the final step -- was likely Thursday.

[On Thursday, Turkey's ruling Justice and Development Party said it wanted the parliamentary debate delayed until Saturday, Reuters reported.]

The plans to allow Turkish forces into Iraq already have provoked anger and concern among the 3.5 million Iraqi Kurds who since the 1991 Persian Gulf War have enjoyed a flourishing self-rule in northern Iraq under the protection of U.S. and British air patrols that keep out Hussein's military. A Bush administration envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, addressed Kurdish and other anti-Hussein Iraqi leaders in northern Iraq today, seeking to reassure them that Washington does not plan to sell them out.

Khalilzad was on a mission to Salahuddin, just north of Irbil in northern Iraq , where the U.S.-sponsored opposition groups opened a long-delayed meeting just 20 miles from territory under control of Hussein's troops. The meeting, the first all-opposition gathering on Iraqi soil in 11 years, was called to discuss the future of Iraq after Hussein's expected removal. But it quickly focused on the bargain with Turkey and widely discussed U.S. plans to run postwar Iraq with a military government.

In a speech to 54 opposition delegates, Khalilzad said that it was up to Iraqis to choose their leaders and that the U.S. military occupation would last only until a democratic government could be organized and take power. But he made no pledges to turn the government over to the Kurdish militias and exile groups whose leaders have campaigned tirelessly against Hussein, with U.S. encouragement, and had hoped to be the logical U.S. choice for Iraq's next leadership.

"None of us want Saddamism without Saddam," Khalilzad declared, seeking to allay opposition fears that the Bush administration is looking for another strongman to replace Hussein.

Khalilzad did not address Turkish intervention directly in his speech. But in a briefing for reporters afterward, he said Turkish troops would enter Iraq in "coordination" with invading U.S. forces and leave when they do. "We are opposed to a unilateral Turkish move here," he told reporters after his speech.

Massoud Barzani, who heads the Kurdistan Democratic Party, one of two Kurdish movements that run the autonomous north, said in a speech that the Iraqi opposition rejects intervention by any "regional power," clearly alluding to Turkey. The Kurds, who constitute the most numerous and best armed element of the U.S.-supported opposition, harbor centuries-old resentment of the Turks and have expressed strong opposition to an occupation.

The leader of an Iranian-based Iraqi opposition militia, embracing principally members of Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority, warned against U.S. domination of Iraq and cautioned that a prolonged occupation could provoke "the sensitivities of religious and patriotic societies."

"One of the greatest dangers we face is the imposition of foreign hegemony over Iraq and its resources," said the leader, Mohammed Bakir Hakim of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

U.S. and Turkish officials here in Ankara, the Turkish capital, continued to tweak the agreement on northern Iraq, but officials familiar with the talks said almost all disputes have been settled. The leader of Turkey's governing Justice and Development Party, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, predicted parliament will vote Thursday to approve the U.S. deployment and allow the U.S. military to proceed with its preparations.

Officials involved in the talks said it became clear a deal would be reached after Turkey agreed to accept some of the spending limits that U.S. officials had insisted on attaching to $6 billion in grants and billions more in expected loans, and after the United States addressed Turkish concerns about the Kurds.

The Turkish government fears that a Kurdish state in northern Iraq would encourage separatist sentiment among the estimated 12 million Kurds who live in Turkey. For much of the past two decades, the Turkish military has battled Kurdish separatists, who sometimes used northern Iraq as a base for attacks in Turkey.

Erdogan said the government plans to send as many as 40,000 troops across the border. He said the Turkish troops would be under Turkish command, but stay behind the U.S. forces. Pressed, he added, "You never know, they may go further."

Armagan Kuloglu, a retired Turkish general with the Center for Eurasian Strategic Studies, said the mission of the Turkish military would be to prevent refugees from entering Turkey and to stop Iraqi Kurds from seizing oil fields near Kirkuk and Mosul that would give them economic power to establish an autonomous state. He said the military would also seek to protect the interests of Turkmen residents in Iraq, a population he estimated at nearly 3 million.

He said the Turkish military would stay back and see if U.S. troops follow through on U.S. promises, but would not hesitate to move beyond the 121/2-mile limit to protect Turkey's interests if it believed the United States was not doing so.

"We're talking about Turkey's security. We can't entrust our security entirely to another party. We have to be ready to take steps ourselves if necessary," he said. "The mission would be to control northern Iraq, temporarily."

A senior member of the Turkish government said Turkey would not oppose a federation government in Iraq "if it is decided by the Iraqi people themselves. What we're saying is, one element of Iraq should not impose its model on the whole country."

The deal on U.S. deployment -- as many as 62,000 U.S. troops and 310 military aircraft using Turkish bases -- would allow the Army's 4th Infantry Division to push forward with long-delayed preparations for a cross-border attack. At least five U.S. ships have been waiting offshore to begin unloading tanks and other equipment, and dozens more are on the way.

According to reports in the Turkish press, U.S. troops would arrive at the ports of Iskenderun and Mersin on the Mediterranean coast, then establish six tent cities in the southeastern provinces of Gaziantep, Malatya, Diyarbakir, Mardin and Batman, and in Silopi district of Sirnak province, near the border with northern Iraq. Air bases at Incirlik and Diyarbakir would be used for raids on Iraq, while at least three other airports would be used for cargo and fuel transport.

Williams reported from Salahuddin.




© 2003 The Washington Post Company


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