Kurdistan can be a model for democracy in a troubled region

mbig · Oct 22, 2011

I strongly support the creation of an Independent Kurdistan
The deserve it.
They were the only big losers/screw-ees in the Ottoman break-up.
The Spoils went to the Arabs/Saudis with the Brits giving the false concoction 'Iraq' to Faisal, a Hashemite (as Jordan was given to another, Abdullah).

The World's largest Ethnic (as well as a distinct cultural, lingual) group without a state have shown themselves an industrious and capable people.
Given any freedom whatsoever, including a mere 'no-fly- zone in a hostile country, they created a booming enclave.

They are also Western/Westerner friendly.
Unlike the rest of Iraq... not to mention Iran, Syria, and increasingly Hostile/Islamist Erdogan.
The below talks mainly about Iraqi Kurds but goes for virtually all I think.
This just the first of Many posts I intend on the topic.

The Commentator - Kurdistan can be a model for democracy in a troubled region
Were it not for the first Gulf War, Saddam would have wiped the Kurds off the map. Why doesn't the UN recognise his violence as genocide?
Robert Halfon MP /\ 1 October 2011

[......]As Vice-Chair of the All-Party Group for Kurdistan, I have visited twice, and have seen firsthand the evidence of genocide. Despite regional instability, autonomous Kurdistan was established in 2003. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) makes its own laws, controls its own army, and decides its own pace of economic development. In contrast to most other parts of Iraq, KRG is relatively terrorist-free. [......] It’s worth looking at how far Kurdistan fulfills some of these criteria:

PROPERTY RIGHTS: The draft Kurdistan constitution (it's still a draft) includes several articles concerning the protection of minority, political and property rights. In Ankawa, the main Christian town in Erbil governorate, there is even special heritage protection for the property owned by the local community.

RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE: The Kurdish regional parliament has now officially recognised the rights of other minorities such Turkmen, and Assyrians, and these are reflected in the electoral system.In fact, Kurdistan is one of the only safe-havens for Christians and Jews in the region. Whilst Christians are being murdered and persecuted across Iraq and Iran, in Kurdistan they are welcomed. The Kurdish President has even invited Christian refugees to take up safe haven in his region.

THE RULE OF LAW: Crime is very low compared to neighbouring Iraq, and the UK has helped the Kurdish Police authorities to build forensic skills, rather than relying the traditional “confession-based” policing. The Kurdish judiciary are Independent, and have defended the right of free assembly during the Arab Spring.
WOMEN’S RIGHTS: On women’s rights, the Kurdistan Parliament has recently passed tough laws against domestic violence. This made female genital mutilation, forced marriage, and child labour all criminal offences for the first time.

FREE ACCESS TO EDUCATION: As the Kurdish economy is Booming, universities too are flourishing, and despite some set-backs there is a real focus on improving education. Illiteracy has fallen from 37% to to just 16% since 2003, and is now at about the same level as London in 2011. [.....]

Temporal · Oct 22, 2011

Azerbejan is another middle eastern country that represents a strong liberal democracy, but the meda never talks about it. Gotta maintain the image of savage Muslims, after all.

Medusa · Oct 23, 2011

ı know you are trying to make that map come true but imposible,today i will take part in the meeting to protest terrorist attacks of that bloody primitive kurds....as a whole nation we will show our reaction to our enemies.......

spud_meister · Oct 23, 2011

Medusa said:
ı know you are trying to make that map come true but imposible,today i will take part in the meeting to protest terrorist attacks of that bloody primitive kurds....as a whole nation we will show our reaction to our enemies.......

:lol: If you give the Kurds a state, odds are the violence will end, at least in other countries. I have doubts about groups like the PKK being able to live peacefully within a Kurdish state.

Disputatious71 · Oct 23, 2011

Medusa said:
ı know you are trying to make that map come true but imposible,today i will take part in the meeting to protest terrorist attacks of that bloody primitive kurds....as a whole nation we will show our reaction to our enemies.......

Kinda like your whole nations reaction to the Armenians ?

Councilman · Oct 23, 2011

Temporal said:
Azerbejan is another middle eastern country that represents a strong liberal democracy, but the meda never talks about it. Gotta maintain the image of savage Muslims, after all.

Having been a part of the media I hate to repeat a famous. I have no clue of it's origin: "If it bleeds it leads."

Most media are more interested in ratings and they believe that ratings are based on blood and guts, so push the hate, sex and destruction as far as you can.

I never bought into that theory and always tried to tell all the news as it happened good bad or indifferent.

I believe there are a large number of Radical Shiites and Iran is controlled by them. These Radicals are very dangerous to the Region and the world,

I welcome anyone to the world of Democracy what I will never understand is why no one uses our Constitution as guide how to do it right.

Medusa · Oct 23, 2011

Disputatious71 said:
Kinda like your whole nations reaction to the Armenians ?

mark geragos had admitted that they just wanted 'money' if you dont believe in me. ı cant do anything... sorry.

Lord Tammerlain · Oct 23, 2011

Just a point

The Kurds are not the largest ethnic group without a state of their own.

The Tamils are a larger ethnic group without an independant state of their own

Disputatious71 · Oct 23, 2011

Medusa said:
mark geragos had admitted that they just wanted 'money' if you dont believe in me. ı cant do anything... sorry.

Help me out here exactly what does Mark Geragos' greed have to do with your countries Armenian Genocide which incidentally started almost 42 years BEFORE Mark was born?

Medusa · Oct 23, 2011

Disputatious71 said:
Help me out here exactly what does Mark Geragos' greed have to do with your countries Armenian Genocide which incidentally started almost 42 years BEFORE Mark was born?

ask Mark please.he is the advocate of Armenian diaspora.and we dont call it ' genocide' , and US presidents agree with me too....and let me say that turkey hadnt been founded yet when those tragedy was experienced.

Disputatious71 · Oct 23, 2011

Medusa said:
ask Mark please.he is the advocate of Armenian diaspora.and we dont call it ' genocide' , and US presidents agree with me too....and let me say that turkey hadnt been founded yet when those tragedy was experienced.

It sounds like you are friends with both Mark & pResident 0bama but you and them still are wrong when it comes to what your country did to the Armenians, it was genocide !

mbig · Oct 23, 2011

Kurdistan Is a Model for Iraq
Our path to a Secular, federal democracy is inspired by the U.S.
By MASOUD BARZANI (president of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq/KRG)
Wall Street Journal // Nov 12, 2008
Kurdistan Is a Model for Iraq - WSJ.com

Iraq's Kurds have consistently been America's closest allies in Iraq. Our Peshmerga forces fought alongside the U.S. military to liberate the country, suffering more casualties than any other U.S. ally.
And while some Iraqi politicians have challenged the U.S.-Iraq security agreement, Iraq's Kurdish leaders have endorsed the pact as essential for U.S. combat troops to continue fighting terrorists in Iraq.
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) is committed to a federal, democratic Iraq that is at Peace with its neighbors.

We have benefited enormously from the service and sacrifices of America's armed forces and their families, and we are deeply grateful. We are also proud to have shared in such sacrifices; my brother was among those severely wounded during the liberation of Iraq. Last year, following a U.S. request, we deployed Kurdish troops to Baghdad. These troops played a decisive role in the success of the surge. Last month I once again visited Baghdad to meet with the leadership of the federal government. We stressed our commitment to developing an Iraqi state that abides by its constitution and that is based upon a federal model with clearly delineated powers for its regions.
[.........]
My meeting last month in Baghdad with the Turkish special envoy to Iraq was a historic and positive development. There should be further direct contacts between the KRG and Turkey, as well as multilateral contacts that involve the U.S. We are eager to work with Turkey to seek increased peace and prosperity in the region.

I am proud that the Kurdistan Region is both a model and gateway for the rest of Iraq. Our difficult path to a Secular, Federal Democracy is very much inspired by the U.S. And so we look forward to working with the Obama-Biden administration to support and defend our hard-fought successes in Iraq, and to remain proud of what the Kurdistan region is today: a thriving civil society in the heart of the Middle East.
When we insist on strict compliance with our country's constitution, we are only following America's great example.

Medusa · Oct 23, 2011

but mrbig agrees that all nations have a right to defend themselves.so turkey has a right too......

am ı wrong???

also ı know that turks and jews cant be enemies.. excluding some of them

ı suggest you watch 'the turkish passport'...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6-Jt0NpYuY

mbig · Oct 23, 2011

Medusa said:
but mrbig agrees that all nations have a right to defend themselves.so turkey has a right too......
am ı wrong???
also ı know that turks and jews cant be enemies.. excluding some of them

Turkey certainly has a right to Hit the PKK.
However, that doesn't change the fact Kurds are at least as entitled to a state as Palestinians.
Not all, or even most of it, would be necessarily from Turkey.
The fact is Turkey opposed an Independent Kurdistan even in Iraq and threatened to invade if one materialized.
So Kurds have, and probably will, have to settle for autonomous zones at best.

ı suggest you watch 'the turkish passport'...
Ezberleri Bozacak Bir Film: "The Turkish Passport" - YouTube

Very admirable but a bit off topic.
(see The Jewish Foundation for the Righteous: Home if you're interested in the wonderful deeds of the time)
I think, as usual, you're suggesting Jews sell out the Kurds for one Turkish bargaining chip or another. In this case a past one while Erdogan Rants in the present.
It's bad enough the USA has done so many times already.

toomuchtime_ · Oct 23, 2011

mbig said:
Turkey certainly has a right to Hit the PKK.
However, that doesn't change the fact Kurds are at least as entitled to a state as Palestinians.
Not all, or even most of it, would be necessarily from Turkey.
The fact is Turkey opposed an Independent Kurdistan even in Iraq and threatened to invade if one materialized.
So Kurds have, and probably will, have to settle for autonomous zones at best.

Very admirable but a bit off topic.
(see The Jewish Foundation for the Righteous: Home if you're interested in the wonderful deeds of the time)
I think, as usual, you're suggesting Jews sell out the Kurds for one Turkish bargaining chip or another. It's bad enough the USA has done so many times already.

An interesting side note is that Turkey caused much of its current problems by refusing to allow US troops to cross Turkey to invade Iraq. That meant that the few US troop that were already there had to depend on Kurdish militias to fight Saddam's troops and their victories over Saddam's troops encouraged them to demand a semi autonomous state and that has encouraged Kurds in
Turkey, Iran and Syria to demand the same.

Tashah · Oct 24, 2011

Two large problems loom in regards to an independent Kurdistan.

1) The Kurdish people span a large area that covers northern Iraq and intrudes into border areas of Iran, Turkey, and Syria. None of these sovereign nations would countenance losing any of their territory.

2) The Kurds of northern Iraq are sitting on a valuable commodity. Both Turkey and Iran covet the Kirkuk/Mosul oil fields. Any declaration of Kurdish independence would trigger Turkish/Iranian military intervention, with the capture/occupation of the oil fields being the main priority.

Djoop · Oct 24, 2011

mbig said:
I strongly support the creation of an Independent Kurdistan

I strongly agree.

People have to make up their mind in regards to self determination. One either supports it or not.

Medusa · Oct 24, 2011

in fact it is stated that there are lots of oil reserves in turkish territories.but somehow we cant make use of this..even under black sea , there have been a majority of reserves.

toomuchtime_ · Oct 24, 2011

Tashah said:
Two large problems loom in regards to an independent Kurdistan.

1) The Kurdish people span a large area that covers northern Iraq and intrudes into border areas of Iran, Turkey, and Syria. None of these sovereign nations would countenance losing any of their territory.

2) The Kurds of northern Iraq are sitting on a valuable commodity. Both Turkey and Iran covet the Kirkuk/Mosul oil fields. Any declaration of Kurdish independence would trigger Turkish/Iranian military intervention, with the capture/occupation of the oil fields being the main priority.

Another way to put it is that the establishment of a sovereign state of Kurdistan might destabilize the region and lead to undesirable outcomes. Isn't that what some were saying about a sovereign state of Israel some years ago? The soon to be Israelis were able to find friends like France and the US to speak for them in diplomatic and political venues and that made all the difference in clearing the way for the Jews to create their own state of Israel.

No one speaks for the Kurds. For all the years when Saddam was slaughtering Kurds and putting their women and children in concentration camps, no one spoke for the Kurds, not the US, not the Europeans, not Israel. For all those decades when Turkey worked at committing cultural genocide by banning any expression of Kurdish culture including virtually any use of the Kurdish language, even outlawing Kurdish names for one's children, no one spoke for the Kurds. And today when Turkey uses US F-16's and Israeli drones to hunt down and bomb Kurdish villages, well, of course, no one speaks for the Kurds.

A few days ago, there were reports that Turkey was in the process of bombing 60 Kurdish villages in which they believed some militants may have taken refuge. Has the world forgotten how to say disproportionate force? In a few months, the US will leave Iraq and Iraqi Kurdistan will be left to the mercies of Iraqi Arabs, Iran, Syria and Turkey, and if any or all of them invade, will anyone speak for the Kurds?

Medusa · Oct 24, 2011

what kind of report?

where is your evidence ??
which villages were bombed do you think??
their names ,please..

hehe )

toomuch says mrbig likes
and mbig says then toomuch likes..

mbig · Oct 24, 2011

Medusa said:
what kind of report?
where is your evidence ??
which villages were bombed do you think??
their names ,please..
hehe )
toomuch says mrbig likes
and mbig says then toomuch likes..

This just up until 1999.
Turkey has relaxed it's Ethnic Cleansing somewhat in the last decade to try and gain EU Membership, but the carnage continues.

Turkey's War on the Kurds. - Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists | HighBeam Research
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Article date: March 1999
McKiernan, Kevin

Behind army lines in the Turkish province of Siirt... army commander, accompanied by a group of government-armed village guards, had arrived and given residents 24 hours to get out of town. Some quickly dug holes in the outlying fields to bury valuables; others just gathered up what they could carry and abandoned the rest.
[.......]After World War I, Kurds hoped to create a homeland from the wreckage of the Ottoman Empire, but those dreams vanished with the birth of the Turkish Republic in 1923. Riding a wave of nationalism, Mustafa Kemal--known as Ataturk, "the Father of the Turks"--imposed a single identity on the multicultural population of Turkmans, Armenians, Assyrians, Kurds, and others. Most minorities were forcibly assimilated; everyone became a Turk.
[.......]The war in Turkey represents the single largest use of U.S. weapons anywhere in the world by non-U.S. forces, according to Bill Hartung of the World Policy Institute..... In 15 years of fighting in Turkey nearly 40,000 lives have been lost, more than in the conflicts on the West Bank and in Northern Ireland combined. The Two Million refugees produced by the war in Kurdistan are roughly the number of homeless created by the widely reported war in Bosnia, where U.S. weapons were not a factor. In contrast, 75% of the Turkish arsenal was made in the United States, according to estimates. Despite these statistics, the civil strife in Turkey has received comparatively little coverage in the U.S. media. Television news rarely mentions the Kurds, unless the story relates to the Iraqi Kurds. It is almost as though there are two sets of Kurds--the Kurds in Iraq, who seem to be viewed as the "good" Kurds because they oppose Saddam, and the Kurds in Turkey, who are "bad" because they oppose a U.S. ally. It doesn't seem to matter that there are four times as many Kurds in Turkey, or that both populations have suffered repression from their respective governments.

Until 1991, Kurdish Music and Language, Dress, Associations, and Newspapers were Banned by the Turkish government. After the Gulf War, Kurdish printing was legalized, but in the intervening years numerous Kurdish newspaper offices have been bombed and closed. More than a dozen Kurdish journalists, as well as numerous politicians and activists, have been killed by death squads (human rights groups list more that 4,000 extrajudicial killings during the period). Despite 15 years of fighting the PKK, Turkey today has no POWs; most rebels, according to the government, have been "captured dead." But there are large numbers of civilian Kurds in Turkish prisons where, according to organizations like Amnesty International, the use of torture is routine. Kurdish TV and radio are still illegal in Turkey, although the government has promised to soften the ban. The Kurdish language still may not be taught in schools or used by merchants on storefronts or in advertising. It is illegal in Turkey for parents to give their child a Kurdish name....

Ethnic Cleansing on an Epic scale.

Medusa · Oct 24, 2011

yes toomuch ı wonder which villages were bombed in a few days...

which civillians were killed ?

mrbig ,are you toomuch?

which reliable agency proves that we killed civillians in afew days??

Medusa · Oct 24, 2011

ı dont know why but both mbig and toomuch like me very much but they hide their locations.

)

and they post unrelated links here..

djoop did you read my link which you wanted me to post?

toomuchtime_ · Oct 24, 2011

Medusa said:
what kind of report?

where is your evidence ??
which villages were bombed do you think??
their names ,please..

hehe )

toomuch says mrbig likes
and mbig says then toomuch likes..

There are loads of reports about the current Turkish atrocities.

While the world is busy with the war in Libya and NATO’s daily bombardment of Tripoli, here in Iraqi Kurdistan, a member of NATO, Turkey, is busy bombarding villages and roads in and around Qandil mountains in the Kurdistan region. Today is the fourth day of the bombardment by Turkey, their target supposedly are PKK guerrilla fighters based in Qandil mountains, yet many casualties among the civilian, just two days ago, a family of seven were killed while in a car heading to their farm, never getting there. Since the bombardment has started, almost all the civilian populations has left the villages in Qandil, most of them now living in refugee camps, all their belonging, farms, cattle and houses are destroyed or are left without a care.

It was while talking about this with a friend that the question rose “Why is Turkey targeting Villages, farms, cattle, Livelihood of the villager, and the civilian population itself more than the PKK fighters?” The answer is very simple: For decades Turkey has been fighting PKK without any success, just bombarding PKK fighters and targets are not enough to win a war, now a new policy , with the new military commanders in Ankara showing their hand: The plan is to make the population in Qandil (which is the supply lifeline to the fighter) turn against them by blaming them for their misery, and if they can’t success on that, they must kill that lifeline by making the Qandil region a no man land, no village, no civilian population, no supply line, and therefore no lifeline for the PKK. Turkey has done similar tactic in the mid 90s in the Kurdish region of Turkey, but it is the first time they target the civilian population in such a large scale in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Burn: Turkey’s Bombardment of Qandil Mountain | The Moving Silent

Open the link to see the wasteland Turkish bombs are creating where Kurdish villages used to be in northern Iraq.

Medusa · Oct 24, 2011

you have to give me reliable evidences

especially about the latest news..as you know at least 50 terrorist were killed. and you wıll prove that they are not terrorists but they are kurdish civillians..

before admitting their civil attacks , you just blame your own country!!

in that link( a kurdish blog) a kurdish called karzan kardozi claims somethings. are you kidding???

you have to post a reliable agency news

Kurdistan can be a model for democracy in a troubled region

mbig

onomatopoeic

Temporal

Medusa

spud_meister

Veni, vidi, dormivi!

Disputatious71

Councilman

Medusa

Lord Tammerlain

Disputatious71

Medusa

Disputatious71

mbig

onomatopoeic

Medusa

mbig

onomatopoeic

toomuchtime_

Well-known member

Tashah

Djoop

Medusa

toomuchtime_

Well-known member

Medusa

mbig

onomatopoeic

Medusa

Medusa

toomuchtime_

Well-known member

Medusa

Kurdistan can be a model for democracy in a troubled region

onomatopoeic

Veni, vidi, dormivi!

onomatopoeic

onomatopoeic

Well-known member

Well-known member

onomatopoeic

Well-known member

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