appConfigEntityId

bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

isVideo

articlePageQuery

article

articleSchemaContent

content

hooksArticlePageAdvertisementConfigArticle

appConfig

filter

json

liveArticle

Reuters

About 100,000 Kurds have fled the Kirkuk region for fear of persecution since Iraqi armed forces retook disputed territory after a Kurdish independence vote rejected by Baghdad, Kurdish officials said on Thursday.
The United Nations voiced concern at reports that civilians, mainly Kurds, were being driven out of parts of northern Iraq retaken by Iraqi forces and their houses and businesses looted and destroyed, and urged Baghdad to stop any such abuses.
In the first incident of deadly violence, a Kurdish man was killed and six wounded by Iraqi security forces while protesting at the army’s takeover of their town, Khanaqin, by Iraqi forces, local Mayor Mohammed Mulla Hassan said.
Kurdish troops had left Khanaqin, near the border with Iran, on Tuesday to avoid clashing with advancing Iraqi forces.

Central government forces swept into Kirkuk, a multi-ethnic city of more than 1 million people and the hub of a major oil-producing area, largely unopposed on Monday after most Kurdish Peshmerga forces withdrew rather than fight.
Iraqi forces also took back control of Kirkuk oilfields, effectively halving the amount of output under the direct control of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in a serious blow to the Kurds’ independence quest.
Baghdad’s recovery of Kirkuk, situated just outside the KRG’s official boundaries on disputed land claimed by Kurds, ethnic Turkmen and Arabs, put the city’s Kurds in fear of attack by Shiite Muslim paramilitaries, known as Popular Mobilisation, assisting government forces’ operations in the region.
Iraqi army grabs nearly all disputed areas from Kurds almost without a fight
Nawzad Hadi, governor of Arbil, the KRG capital, told reporters that around 18,000 families from Kirkuk and the town of Tuz Khurmato to the southeast had taken refuge in Arbil and Sulaimaniya, inside KRG territory.
Hemin Hawrami, a top aide to KRG President Massoud Barzani, tweeted that people had fled “looting and sectarian oppression” inflicted by Popular Mobilisation militia.
UN relief officials said they had received allegations that 150 houses had been burned and 11 blown up in Tuz Khurmato and offices of Turkmen political parties in Kirkuk assaulted.
The UN Assistance Mission for Iraq issued a statement urging the Baghdad government “to take every action to halt any violations and ensure all civilians are protected and that the perpetrators of acts of violence, intimidation and forced displacement of civilians be brought to justice”.
Khanaqin, mainly populated by Kurds, also lies in long contested territory just outside KRG boundaries.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi said on Wednesday that security was being maintained in Kirkuk by local police backed by the elite Counter Terrorism Service, trained and equipped by the United States mainly to fight Islamic State militants. “All other armed group should not be allowed to stay,” Abadi said.
Sunni Muslim Kurds comprise the largest community in Kirkuk followed by Sunni and Shiite Muslim Turkmen, Sunni Arabs and Christian Assyrians, according to the Iraqi Planning Ministry.
In another sign of rising tensions, Iraq’s Supreme Justice Council ordered the arrest of KRG Vice President Kosrat Rasul for allegedly saying Iraqi troops were “occupying forces” in Kirkuk.
Iran and Turkey joined the Baghdad government in condemning the Iraqi Kurds’ September 25 referendum, worried it could worsen regional instability and conflict by spurring their own Kurdish populations to push for homelands. The Kurds’ long-time big power ally, the United States, also opposed the vote.

Iraqi armed forces also took control of Kurdish-held areas of Nineveh province north of Kirkuk, including the Mosul hydroelectric dam, after the Peshmerga pulled back.
Crude oil flows through the KRG pipeline to the Turkish port of Ceyhan have been disrupted by a gap between incoming and outgoing personnel since Baghdad’s retaking of Kirkuk.
An Iraqi oil ministry official in Baghdad said on Thursday that Iraq would not be able to restore Kirkuk’s oil output to levels before Sunday because of missing equipment at two fields.
The official accused the Kurdish authorities previously in control of Kirkuk of removing equipment at the Bai Hasan and Avana oilfields, northwest of the city.
Kurds have sought independence since at least the end of the first world war when colonial powers carved up the Middle East after the multi-ethnic Ottoman Empire sundered, leaving Kurdish-inhabited land split between Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria.


Tanker hit by explosion near Hormuz hours after US strikes on Iran

27 countries seek access to World Bank funds since Iran war

Beijing had already won before the Trump-Xi summit even started

Vietnam asks US to allow ‘extremely important’ oil tanker to slip past Hormuz blockade

Iraq

100,000 Kurds abandon Kirkuk after Iraqi army occupies disputed city

Displaced Iraqi Kurds fleeing violence in northern Kirkuk province are seen at an unfinished public housing estate where they are taking shelter in Arbil, the capital of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, on October 19, 2017. Photo: Agence France-Presse

Kurdish Peshmerga fighters sit on a military vehicle north of Kirkuk, Iraq October 19, 2017. REUTERS/Ako Rasheed

Displaced Iraqi Kurdish people fleeing violence in the northern Kirkuk province sit an unfinished housing project where they are taking shelter in Arbil, the capital of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, on October 19, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / SAFIN HAMED

A file picture taken on September 12, 2017 shows Iraq's Kurdistan region president Massud Barzani (C) attending a meeting with Kirkuk provincial Governor Najim al-Din Karim (R), first Deputy for the Secretary General of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) party Kosrat Rasoul Ali (L), Peshmerga commander Jaafar Sheikh Mustafa (R), and other Peshmerga and Kurdish party leaders in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk. A Baghdad court on October 19, 2017, issued an arrest warrant for the vice president of Iraqi Kurdistan on charges of "provocation" against Iraq's armed forces, the judiciary said. / AFP PHOTO / MARWAN IBRAHIM

News

World

Middle East

Kurds accuses Iraqi forces of looting and destroying houses and businesses


100,000 Kurds abandon Kirkuk after Iraqi army occupies disputed city

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Kurds accuses Iraqi forces of looting and destroying houses and businesses

Kurds accuses Iraqi forces of looting and destroying houses and businesses