DUKAN (Iraq) March 9: Iraqi Kurdish leaders vowed on Sunday to repatriate Kurds expelled from their homes in Kirkuk, but stopped short of threatening to take the city by force if the United States invaded Iraq.

Massoud Barzani, head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, which runs part of northern Iraq has warned any Turkish incursion could lead to clashes and he said the Kurds were taking no chances.

Kirkuk lies just outside the northern enclave that Iraqi Kurds wrested from Baghdad’s control after the 1991 Gulf War. It produces hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil a day and control of the city is likely to be a key issue in any war.

Iraqi Kurds regard Kirkuk as historically linked to the mainly Kurdish region, and accuse Baghdad of driving Kurds from the city over the years and replacing them with Arabs. Their claims on Kirkuk arouse deep suspicion in neighbouring Turkey.

“The goal of the Kurdish side is to reverse and put an end to the policy of Arabisation, ethnic cleansing and expulsion of Kurdish people from Kirkuk,” said Massoud Barzani, head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, which runs part of northern Iraq.

“This could be achieved, not necessarily with the peshmerga,” he said, referring to thousands of lightly armed Iraqi Kurdish fighters. “We are united that this must be reversed and people returned to their homes in an orderly manner.”

Barzani was speaking after the first meeting of a new leadership council formed jointly with the rival Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). The two groups fought each other in the mid-1990s but now share control of northern Iraq.

PUK head Jalal Talabani said both parties were committed to finding a peaceful way to deal with Turkey, which fears control of the Kirkuk oil could help entrench the autonomy of Iraqi Kurds, rekindling separatism among its own Kurdish minority.

Ankara has vowed to flood northern Iraq with troops during a US-led war to nip any Kurdish independence drive in the bud and prevent waves of refugees from crossing the border.

But Barzani’s group has warned any Turkish incursion could lead to clashes and he said the Kurds were taking no chances.

“We don’t want any problems with Turkey...or to see clashes or hostilities,” he said, asked about reported movements of Kurdish forces near the Turkish border. “But it is our natural right to take precautionary measures, to not be taken by surprise.”

An Iraqi opposition source said last month that the United States had warned both the Turks and Kurds to keep their hands off Kirkuk in the event of a US-led attack to topple President Saddam Hussein.

—Reuters