November 26, 2002	Tuesday	Ramazan 20, 1423

SULEYMANIEH (Iraq): Kurds living in the autonomous region of northern Iraq are gradually distancing themselves from their Arab roots, even though for strategic reasons Kurdish officials still stress they remain part of Arabic Iraq.

According to the education ministry in the city of Suleymanieh, the only language in primary and high schools as well as universities is Kurdish with the Arabic imposed on the Kurds by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein only used in religion classes.

Arabic will always remain a main language in Kurdistan, said Jamal Aziz, the deputy education minister of Suleymanieh, which is governed by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). The Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP), which rules over the other part of the autonomous zone, confirms this strategy.

However, there is opposition to the policy. “This is nonsense, already the next generation will speak no Arabic any more,” said an academic in Erbil. This is a view shared by many Kurds, but most refrain from articulating it due to loyalty to their governments.

“We wants to bury the past when the Saddam regime issued death verdicts for just using the Kurdish language and rather want all minorities to have the right to speak and be educated in their own language,” said the deputy minister. In the 50,000 square kilometre Kurdish region in northern Iraq, Arabs, Assyrians and Turkmens form less than three per cent of the total 4.5 million population.

“We neither want to separate ourselves from Iraq nor become an independent state,” PUK foreign policy spokesman, Saadi Pireh, said.

“Our aim is instead to form a federation which is effectively working in North Iraq since 1991 and which we also suggest as a suitable alternative for the post-Saddam era,” he added.

Although no Kurd, regardless of whether they are a PUK or KDP supporter, really believes in this official version, nobody wants to cause renewed tensions with neighbours Iran, Syria and Turkey, all of which are strongly opposed to an independent Kurdish state.

Even the fact that the autonomy has long ago established its own administration, including army (former Peshmargas), police, and education system, is justified by PUK and KDP officials as part of the federal system.

Both Kurdish parties also claim to have no interest in establishing links with the more than 22 million Kurds in neighbouring countries, let alone realizing the dream of a united Kurdistan.

“The Kurds in North Iraq are our main concern, not those in other countries,” said Asad Mohammad, the news director of the PUK television network Kurd SAT.

“Furthermore, our facilities are just enough for our own Kurds,” he added.

Since the 1996 Oil-For-Food resolutions, the Kurds in northern Iraq enjoy a good economic situation. In line with the UN resolutions, the autonomous region receives 13 per cent of Iraq’s calculated oil revenues besides the food rations sponsored by the World Food Programme and other facilities provided by non- governmental organizations.

The Kurds have also proven to be not only hard-working farmers but also smart traders with business flourishing within the region as well as with neighbouring states. The poverty of the 1970s and 1980s is no longer visible, either in Suleymanieh or Erbil.

“We want good relations with both the Western and the neighbouring states and avoid any sort of tensions,” said Pireh.

The detente policies seem to be working well with Iran and Syria, with Iran currently being the only country with an open border to northern Iraq.

Turkey, however, follows the developments in northern Iraq with skepticism, being particularly concerned by the autonomous region’s alleged cooperation with the Kurdish rebel group PKK, something which is categorically denied by both political parties in Kurdistan.

The country last month resumed its parliament where the KDP has a majority with 51 of the total 105 seats, followed by the PUK with 49. The remaining five seats are filled by the minorities.

The parliament, branded an insignificant formality by neighbouring countries, is for the Iraqi Kurds the beginning of a new era.

“The de-Arabization process has already started with no way back,” said one Kurdish journalist, articulating what many Kurds hope.—dpa