About Iraqi Kurdistan

What is Iraqi Kurdistan?

Kurdistan is a geographical area divided between the nation states of Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria. It is inhabited mainly by Kurds, and historical evidence show they have been living in the area some thousand years before Christ. The Kurds are, together with Arabs, Persians and Armenians, one of the most ancient peoples of the Near East.

The exact number of Kurds in the world is not known to this date, but approximately, there are about 35 to 40 million people. Although being one of the largest ethnic groups in the world, the Kurds do not have a state of their own. The division of the Kurdish area is a result of numerous wars between neighbouring states, international interests, and broken treaties. The borders that divide Kurdistan are neither natural, economic, nor cultural borders.

Iraqi Kurdistan is a region about 83,000 square kilometres. That is roughly the same size as Jordan or Austria. There are about five million Kurds living in this area. The region is divided in four main provinces – Hawler (also called Erbil), Sulaimaniya, Duhok and Kirkuk – with the regional parliament for Iraqi Kurdistan situated in Hawler.
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The language in Kurdistan is Kurdish, with two major dialects being Kurmanj and Sorany. The great majority of Kurds are Sunni Muslims. Although there are also other religions represented within Kurdistan, amongst them branches of the traditional religion of Zoroastrianism, which is one of the oldest religions in the world.

A brief history

About a thousand years ago, Kurdistan was the theatre of military clashes between the Greek, Roman and Ottoman empires, and the Persian empire. Following World War I, and the break-up of the Ottoman Empire, the Kurds were offered their own state, but the establishment of Kurdistan did not occur. Treaties were broken twice, both in 1920 and later in 1923, because of disagreements within the international community. Kurdistan has stayed divided until this day, and since World War II, the history of Iraqi Kurdistan has been one of displacement, disappearance, destruction, and disrupted lives.

The internal fighting and disagreements in Iraqi Kurdistan has a long history. The two major parties, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), who controlled the region, were unable to cooperate and civil war broke out. In the war between Iraq and Iran in 1980, the Kurds supported the Iranian forces and as the Iran-Iraq war drew to a closing, Iraqi forces launched the "Anfal Campaign" against the Kurds.

Next, the Iraqi regime moved on to its invasion of Kuwait. Saddam Hussein suffered a massive defeat in his war against the allies, and with the end of the war, the UN created a security zone for the Iraqi Kurds in the north.

The Kurdish community now got the opportunity to build a more stable society without the interference of the Iraqi government, but the difficulties were many. The Kurdish region was for example disconnected from the national electricity network, food rations were cut off, and pensions and governmental salaries were withdrawn. The UN “Oil-for-Food” program began to function in 1997 and provided the region with food rations from Iraq's public oil wealth. Iraqi Kurdistan has been isolated from the rest of the world since 1991, and only a couple of years after the millennium the region obtained access to the Internet.

With the allied invasion of Baghdad in March 20, 2003, the real freedom for Iraqi Kurds begins. Kurds were supporting the invasion all along, and with the capture of their former dictator in December 13, 2003, they finally dared to believe freedom had come. After years of internal fighting and disagreements, the two Kurdish parties have finally settled with a joint parliament, situated in the city of Hawler. Massoud Barzani is the president of Iraqi Kurdistan, since the PUK-leader, Jalal Talabani, was sworn in as the president of the liberated Iraq April 7, 2005.