Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka
Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Baszn Özeti
la main sur le cœur, à la réception du 14 Juillet
célébrée chaque année à Ankara? Quant à
OYAK [une holding contrôlée par l'armée
turque, partenaire de Renault en Turquie],
va-t-elle continuer à entretenir les mêmés
relations avec Renault et avec les au~res'
entreprises françaises? S'il fallait résumer
le problème en une seule question, ce serait
la suivante: allons-nous continuer encore
longtemps à êontribuer à \a prospérité d'un
pays, qui barre le chemin à notre propre prospérité
? Ou allons-nous enfin savoir dire cour&
geusenient: "Non à la Franœ en Turquie!"?
Si nous osons le dire, croyez-moi, cela va
faire mal, car nous vivons dans un monde où
les intérêts économiques comptent plus 'que.
_tout. Et les Français le savent mieux que qUiconque.
Semlh IIdlz, AKSAM, Istanbul.
William Safire '
America shouldn't abandon the Kurds
WASHINGTON
l ' n his eagerness for the approval of the Shiite religious
leader - and driven by desperation to get will move from his post as America's UN representa-
I ran this pained appeal past John Negroponte, who
the unanimous United Nations Security Council tive to be U.S. ambassador to the new Iraq, at his
resolution passed on Tuesday in time for the farewelliunch on Tuesday. He pointed to a line in the
Group of Eight meeting - President George W. Bush preamble to the UN resolution welcoming an unspecified
commitment "to work towards a federal, demo-
may be double-crossing the Kurds, America's most
loyal friends inIraq.
cratic, pluralist and unified Iraq, in which there is full
Not a single U.S. soldier has been killed in the area respect for political and human
of northern Iraq patrolled by the pesh merga, the army rights."
of Kurdish Iraqis that has brought or!ier to their region.
Savaged by Saddam Hussein's poison gas attacks
in the '80s, Kurdistan was abandoned by the first President
Bush to Saddam's vengeance after the first Gulf
War. When America's conscience made Washington
provide air cover in the '90s, the Kurds amazed the
Middle East by creating a free, democratic mini-state
within despotic Iraq.
These Kurdish Sunni Muslims - an ancient ethnic
group, neither Arab nor Turk - are one-fifth ofIraq's
population. They cheered America's arrival and set
aside old dreams of independencl'!, asking for reasonable
autonomy in return for participating enthusiastically
in the formation of the new Iraq.
In February, the Iraqi Governing Council, which included
all religiÇlus and ethnic groups, hammered out
its only memorable worle a Transitional Administrative
Law, which laid the groundwork for a Constitution
to be adopted later by elected officials in a sovereign
state. Most important for Kurds, who have long
been oppressed by an Arab majority, it established
minority rights within a federal state - the essence of
a stable democracy.
But as the UN resolution supporting that state was
nearing completion, the Shiite grand ayatollah, Ali
Husseini al-Sistani, suddenly intervened. He denounced
the agreed-upon law as "legislated by an unelected
council in the shadow of occupation." He decreed
that mentioning it in the UN resolution would
be"a harbinger of g~ave consequences."
The United States promptly caved. Stunned Kurds
protested to BUsJ1that "the people of Kurdistan will
no longer accept second-class citizenship in Iraq." If
the law guaranteeing minority rights was abrogated,
Kurds would "have no choice but to refrain from participating
in the central government, not to take part
in the national elections, and to bar representatives of
. the central government from Kurdistan."
Massoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani, the Kurdish
leaders, appealed to Bush's sense of loyalty: "We will
be loyal friends to America even if our support is not
. always reciprocated ~.. If the forces of freedom [do
notl prevail elsewhere in Iraq, we know that, because
of our alliance with the United States, we will be
marked for vengeance."
Why does the United
States take its proven
allies for granted?
Fine "preambular" words, but
outside the action section of the resolution.
That eviscerates the protectivelaw,
just asSistani demanded.
Why does the United States take
its proven allies for granted? The
conventional White House wisdom
, holds that the Iraqi Kurds have no place else to go. It's
an article of faith that if the Kurds tried to break away
and set up an independent Kurdistan, with oil-rich
Kirkuk as its traditional capital, Turkey, on its border,
would never permit it - lest murderous separatists
among its .own Kurdish population of 12 million get a
new lease on death.
Iraqi Kurds blundered last year in letting old grudges
prevent Ankara from sending 10,000 troops south to
help the coalition police Iraq. But since then, Kurdish
leaders have gone all-out to establish economic and
political relations with "our friends to the north."
A Turkish construction company is building a $40-
million airport in Sulaimaniya, and Kurds have been
, steering contracts to Turkish engineers
to study sports, stadiums and
. tunnels through the mountains. Despite
grumbling from some anti-
,Kurdish generals, Turkey's prime
minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
has been responsive. The influen:'
. tial Hnur Cevik of the Turkish Daily
, News urges "more attention to Iraqi
Kurdish sensitivities" and asks: "Do the Arabs realize
what they. are getting into?" ,
America's Kurdish allies will do their bit to hold
Iraq together. But in appeasing the south, don't push "
the north too far.
E-mail: safire@nytimes.com
lIt,ra1b ..
, lune 10, 2004
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