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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

Public Hearing on

Human rights situation of

Turkmen of Iraq

5 December 2011

Subcommittee on Human Rights

European Parliament, Brussels

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

Compiled by the

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization

Brussels

May 2012

Photographs and documents courtesy of European Parliament

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABOUT UNPO ................................................................................................................... 3

BACKGROUND DOCUMENTS ............................................................................................. 4

TURKMEN OF IRAQ ............................................................................................................................................. 4

AGENDA .............................................................................................................................................................. 6

SPEAKER PRESENTATIONS ................................................................................................ 7

OPENING REMARKS

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

............................................................................................................................... 8

OPENING REMARKS

METIN KAZAK MEP

............................................................................................................................................. 9

MINORITY RIGHTS IN IRAQ AND PROSPECTS FOR THE IRAQI TURKMEN IN IRAQ

PROFESSOR STEFAN WOLFF

............................................................................................................................. 11

THE SITUATION OF THE TURKMEN OF IRAQ SINCE APRIL 2003

HASAN ÖZMEN

................................................................................................................................................. 14

THE EFFECTS OF MIGRATION AND THE FUTURE SECURITY OF THE IRAQI TURKMEN

PROFESSOR IBRAHIM SIRKECI

.......................................................................................................................... 17

RESPONSE FROM EUROPEAN EXTERNAL ACTION SERVICE (EEAS)

DOMINIC PORTER

............................................................................................................................................. 20

CLOSING REMARKS

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

............................................................................................................................. 28

DISCUSSION ................................................................................................................... 23

PHOTOGRAPHS .............................................................................................................. 29

SPEAKER BIOGRAPHIES ................................................................................................... 30

MEDIA COVERAGE .......................................................................................................... 32

APPENDICES ................................................................................................................... 33

APPENDIX I: TIMELINE OF EVENTS ........................................................................................................................ 33

APPENDIX II: KEY LEGAL DOCUMENTS.................................................................................................................. 38

APPENDIX III: PRESS RELEASES ............................................................................................................................. 42

PRESS RELEASE (ENGLISH) ................................................................................................................................ 42

PRESS RELEASE (ARABIC) .................................................................................................................................. 43

POST-EVENT PRESS RELEASE ........................................................................................................................... 44

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ABOUT UNPO

The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) is an international,

nonviolent, and democratic membership organization. Its members are indigenous peoples,

minorities, and unrecognized or occupied territories who have joined together to protect

and promote their human and cultural rights, to preserve their environments, and to find

nonviolent solutions to conflicts which affect them. Although the aspirations of UNPO

Members differ greatly, they are all united by one shared condition –they are not

adequately represented at major international fora, such as the United Nations. As a

consequence, their opportunity to participate on the international stage is significantly

limited, as is their ability to access and draw upon the support of the global bodies

mandated to defend their rights, protect their environments, and mitigate the effects of

conflict.

Previous UNPO and Iraqi Turkmen collaborations include a series of conferences held in the

European Parliament on the issue of minority issues in Iraq. The first conference in the

series was convened in 2007, and entitled ‘Iraqi Turkmen: The Human Rights Situation and

Crisis in Kerkuk’. The event aimed to bring representatives of Iraq’s new institutions

together with outside policy makers in a bid to ensure that human rights were a priority in

the reconstruction of the new Iraqi state. This was succeeded a year later in 2008 by the

conference entitled ‘Kerkuk Problem and Article 140: Defining Alternatives - The Views of

Kerkuk’s Turkmen and Arabs’, which examined the functioning of modern day Iraq,

particularly the changes brought to the geographically disputed and oil rich city of Kerkuk.

The Iraqi Turkmen are represented at the UNPO by the Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF) which is an

umbrella organisation of several parties, including the Iraqi National Turkmen Party (INTP),

Turkmeneli Party (TP), Adalet part (AP), Islamic Movement of Iraqi Turkmens (IMIT) and the

Independents Movement.

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO)

Laan van Meerdervoort 70

2517 AN The Hague

The Netherlands

Tel.: +31(0)70 3646504

Fax: +31(0)70 3646608

Avenue Louise 52

B-1050 Brussels

Belgium

Tel.: +32(0)251 314 59

Fax: +32 (0)251 31495

[email protected]

www.unpo.org

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BACKGROUND DOCUMENTS

THE TURKMEN OF IRAQ

The last reliable census data from Iraq, gathered in 1957, identifies the Turkmen as the third

largest ethnic group in Iraq. Their population has long historical roots in northern Iraq,

stretching back beyond the Islamic period, with ongoing settlement throughout subsequent

centuries. Iraqi Turkmen communities rose to prominence during the Umayyad and

Abbasids Caliphates, playing an important role as rulers and administrators under the

Seljuks, Atabags, Mongols, Qara Qoyunlu, Aq Qoyunlu, and Safavids. Turkmen were also

prominent administrators, merchants, and politicians under the rule of the Ottoman Empire,

especially in urban areas such as Kerkuk, Erbil, Tal Afer, and in several districts in Diyala,

Salah al-Din and Kut, where they lived as a majority. The decline of their influence and

marginalisation first began after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the aftermath of the

First World War.

Under British rule and Iraq’s Monarchy, the cultural rights of Turkmen communities were

gradually eroded, and their activists frequently jailed. British rule is also widely viewed by

Turkmen as the beginning of efforts to systematically misrepresent the true extent of their

presence in northern Iraq – in what some have seen as an effort to remove vestiges of

Ottoman rule as they sought to cement their own control.

Following the growth of a burgeoning oil industry in the 1930s, other communities and

minorities, especially the Kurdish, began entering Iraq’s northern cities in large numbers

from mountainous areas in the east. This rapid demographic change produced ethnic

tension and violence and Turkmen communities began to feel the effect of marginalisation.

Tensions were exasperated further with the establishment of Ba’ath Party rule in 1968,

opening a period during which the position of all minorities in Iraq became increasingly

precarious.

After seizing power in 1979, Saddam Hussein’s regime instigated a campaign of intensive

“Arabisation” in regions of northern Iraq that opposed his rule, systematically expelling the

Turkmen, Kurdish and Assyrians, encouraging the resettlement of Arabs, and redrawing

constituencies to dilute the political influence of non-Arab communities. This period of

violence and persecution effectively destroyed Turkmen civil society, forcing many of its

political institutions underground or into exile abroad.

Rebuilding civil society remains the major challenge facing Iraqi Turkmen leaders as the

Post-Ba’athist Iraqi state takes shape. Many Iraqi Turkmen communities believe that their

historical presence and influence in the region has remained marginalised during the

process of reconstructing the Iraqi state, and that more has to be done to correct the past

injustices they have suffered. With limited representation in local administration and

security forces, as well as in the vital Iraq Property Claims Commission, many continue to

feel disenfranchised, despite the changes in Iraq. Perhaps most crucially, Turkmen

communities have come to view the recent waves of immigration into Kerkuk as increasingly

disproportionate, suspicious of the role this might play in the long deferred referendum on

the city’s future status.

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The cities of Tal Afer and Erbil are also considered historical homes to large Iraqi Turkmen

communities. Feelings of marginalisation and exclusion are also beginning to emerge in

these cities, leaving many to fear for the future of Iraqi Turkmen communities in northern

Iraq and the heterogeneity of Iraq’s society as a whole. Many have already taken the

difficult decision to become refugees, seeking refuge in neighbouring countries such as

Turkey and Syria.

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

BACKGROUND DOCUMENTS

AGENDA

Subcommittee on Human Rights

Public Hearing on

Human rights situation of Turkmen in Iraq

5 December 2011

15.30 – 16.45

Room: Altiero Spinelli (ASP) 1 G 2

European Parliament, Brussels

1. Introductory remarks by

Mr Metin Kazak, MEP

Professor Stefan Wolff,

Professor of International Security at the University of

Birmingham,

on minority rights in Iraq and prospects for the Iraqi Turkmen within Iraq

Mr Hasan Özmen,

Member of Parliament, Council of Representatives of Iraq,

on the plight of the Iraqi Turkmen since 2003

Professor Ibrahim Sirkeci,

Director of the Centre for Transnational Studies at

Regent’s College,

on the effects of migration and the future security of the Iraqi Turkmen

EEAS Representative

6. Discussion

7. Concluding remarks by

Ms Barbara Lochbihler,

Chair

The hearing can be followed online:

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/ep-live/en/committees/video?event=20111205-1500-COMMITTEE-

DROI&category=COMMITTEE&format=wmv

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SPEAKER PRESENTATIONS

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OPENING REMARKS

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

The Turkmen live in a region of Iraq which is roughly located around the axis Mosul-Erbil-

Kerkuk, the latter city being the most important. Situated on the border between Arab Iraq

and the Kurdish territory, it is inhabited by a variety of groups, each with their own claims to

the land. The Turkmen themselves, descendants of the Seljuq Turks and later of Ottoman

officials, have lived in the area for many centuries.

Events and policies that have affected the demographic balance in the region date back to

the British mandate and span the era of the Republic, Ba’athist Iraq and the dictatorship of

Saddam Hussein. Our focus today, however, is on the period after April 2003 and on human

rights rather than demographics, although the effects of the latter on the concrete situation

of the Turkmen implies that they will always be part of the equation when making an

analysis.

The situation is very complex and very delicate and rather difficult to fathom, but what

clearly emerges is that on a significant number of levels Turkmens' human rights are

precarious at best and deserve our specific attention. I am hence pleased to welcome such a

diverse array of speakers to share their experiences and expertise with us.

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INTRODUCTION

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

Firstly, may I give the floor to my esteemed colleague Mr. Metin Kazak, who has played a

major part in the organization of this hearing, for the opening remarks.

INTRODUCTARY REMARKS

METIN KAZAK MEP

VICE-CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

Thank you very much Madam Chair.

It is my pleasure to open today’s public hearing on the subject of the human rights situation

of the Turkmen in Iraq. This hearing could not come at a more opportune time and I am

grateful to the Chairperson of this Subcommittee and my colleagues for their interest and

support. In the best spirit of the European Parliament, this meeting transcends the work of

the Subcommittee on Human Rights and is of great importance to our colleagues in the

Committee for Foreign Affairs and the Delegation for Relations with Iraq, amongst others.

The Chair has outlined the background to the situation facing the Turkmen of Iraq today and

I would like to briefly focus on the key question of security. US forces will leave Iraq on 31

December 2011, and with less than a month to go, attentions are being turned to what this

will mean for the balance of influence in Kerkuk and elsewhere. Within Kerkuk an American

presence will remain but this will not be comparable to the joint patrols that have been

successful in preventing the escalation of violence as was once feared.

Kerkuk remains a dangerous city, the accidental deaths of two bomb-makers on Sunday

follows two coordinated bombs attacks on a bus and security services on Saturday in only

the most recent attacks to shake the city. Against this background, as the Chair has noted,

the human rights of the Turkmen in Iraq are precarious.

While the Kurdistan Regional Government has offered to extend security and development

assistance to Kerkuk and other areas, this does not address the desire for equitable division

of power between the city’s many communities. Nor does it begin to address the future

administration of the city and other Turkmen centres, either as new federal regions within

Iraq, incorporated into the Kurdistan Region or in some other administrative arrangement.

However the belief in dialogue is not yet dead despite the daily bomb attacks and

increasingly remote possibility of implementing Article 140 as originally intended. Hassan

Turan, Turkman head of the Kerkuk Provincial Council has acknowledged the “transparent

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and frank” discussions conducted with Kurdish authorities. It is in that spirit and because

the issue of the Turkmen of Iraq also has an international dimension that cannot be ignored,

that this hearing is of such importance. The perspectives our panel today will present are

intended to demonstrate the international impact of policies towards the Turkmen of Iraq

as well as placing the Turkmen situation alongside comparable cases.

I believe that the European Union and its member states have a rich experience that is of

unique value to Iraqi Turkmen and to those seeking to address the complex questions of

property reparations, security, cultural autonomy, and power-sharing that are central to the

situation of the Turkmen of Iraq. This experience comes from our efforts, mistakes, and

successes at building a Europe that has been largely at peace for longer than many of us can

remember.

The intervention into Iraq in 2003 may have divided European opinion but now there is the

opportunity for us to share our experiences. Just as I believe Turkmen and their

compatriots can find inspiration from Europe and perhaps models to follow in their search

for equitable solutions to the problems they face, so I also believe that Europe has much to

learn from Iraq and its people. For too long the European Union presence in Iraq has been

under-resourced and its positions pronounced without any substance to back them up. I

hope that this hearing can be a step to addressing and supporting a new engagement

between the EU and Iraq.

This hearing is focussed on the situation of the Iraqi Turkmen because, of all the

communities in Iraq, I believe Turkmen have been amongst the most overlooked for a

variety of reasons. It is therefore an attempt to raise the issue of the Iraqi Turkmen

alongside that of other communities in Iraq and also to encourage Iraqi Turkmen to step

into the breach and find the strength to decide both their own future and a future in which

they can live in peace – as they had done for decades.

As I have noted, today such a future is threatened by almost daily abuses of Turkmen

human rights. Like other communities, Turkmen are targeted by bombings while

lawlessness allows kidnapping for ransom a frequent and common threat. Without a

solution to the question of property rights many have been left in poverty, dislocated within

a country that has been their home for decades or centuries, and seeing very little future for

them or their families in the short or medium term. It is important that these human rights

be placed in the context of contemporary Iraq, Baghdad’s international obligations, and

measures taken to ensure the age-old tolerances and coexistence that made Iraq a cultural

capital of the Middle East are not lost forever.

Therefore, I hope that this hearing will prove insightful for my colleagues and a spur to

constructive discussion and debate between Iraq’s communities. No one can be under any

illusion that a solution will be easy to come by, but I hope that starting today we can build

on past initiatives and see the goal of a peaceful settlement reached sooner rather than

later.

Thank you very much.

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INTRODUCTION

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

It is now my pleasure to welcome Professor Stefan Wolff as our first guest speaker.

Professor Wolff is professor of International Security at the University of Birmingham (UK),

and specialises in, among other areas, the management of contemporary security

challenges, particularly the prevention and settlement of ethnic conflicts. He has extensive

experience in Northern Ireland, the Balkans, Central and Eastern Europe, and the former

Soviet Union, and has also worked on a wide range of conflicts elsewhere, including the

Middle East, Africa, and Central, South and Southeast Asia. Bridging the divide between

academia and policy-making, Professor Wolff has been involved in various phases of

conflict-settlement processes, including in Iraq, Sudan, Moldova, Sri Lanka and Kosovo. He

has published very widely and has held visiting professorships throughout the world. He will

speak on minority rights in Iraq and prospects for the Iraqi Turkmen within Iraq.

MINORITY RIGHTS IN IRAQ AND PROSPECTS FOR THE IRAQI

TURKMEN IN IRAQ

PROFESSOR STEFAN WOLFF

PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY

UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

Thank you very much, and also thank you very much to the organisers of this meeting to

give me the opportunity to address you on the issue of the current minority rights

framework in Iraq and what that potentially means for the future prospects of the Iraqi

Turkmen community.

By way of introduction, I just want to point out that Turkmen are the third largest group in

Iraq and even though there are no particularly accurate figures about their size, estimates

range from between 600,000 and 2 million Turkmen in Iraq. They live concentrated mostly

in the north of Iraq and the Kurdistan region, but from a security perspective it is also

important to note that the largest compactly settled group of Iraqi Turkmen live in the

disputed territories, including in the city and province of Kerkuk. Turkmen have historically

suffered greatly under Saddam Hussein, and their suffering has been recognized in the Iraqi

Constitution - in the Preamble of the 2005 document. But notwithstanding the recognition

of past suffering of Iraqi Turkmen, they are among those minority groups in contemporary

Iraq that continue to be affected by both ethnic and sectarian violence and discrimination.

Now if we look at the legal framework of minority rights in Iraq, we have to look at three

different aspects. First are the international standards to which Iraq has committed as a

state. The second is the Iraqi Constitution of 2005 that I already mentioned, and also the

Kurdistan Regional Constitution of 2009. In contrast to the legal framework in many other

countries, to date there is no comprehensive minority rights or anti-discrimination law in

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Iraq at the level of ordinary legislation. Even though there are a number of provisions in

existing legislation, like for example the Criminal Code or the Labour Code, these are

potentially quite problematic in that they might allow for discrimination on the basis of

ethnic or sectarian religious belonging.

Now let me just briefly outline the international legal minority rights standards that are

applicable in the case of Iraq. Iraq is a signatory to a number of relevant international

documents and I just want to list them here in chronological order, not necessarily in order

of importance. There is the ILO Convention, No. 111 that concerns discrimination in respect

of employment and occupation. The two International Covenants – the one on Civil and

Political Rights, and the one on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights. Also, the International

Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, to which Iraq has signed

up. Of those, probably the most important is the International Covenant on Civil and

Political Rights, where Article 27 places a very concrete obligation on signatory states to

make sure that people belonging to linguistic, ethnic or religious minorities do actually find

an environment in which they can preserve their ethnic, religious or linguistic identity but

also can develop it, and can do so without fear of discrimination. What is notable about the

international standards is that Iraq is not a signatory to the ILO Convention, No. 169 on the

rights of indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries.

Constitutional provisions in the Constitution of Iraq in 2005 – I already mentioned the

official recognition of the suffering of Turkmen under Saddam Hussein in the Preamble, but

there are a number of other noteworthy articles. Article 3 recognises that Iraq is a country

of multiple nationalities, religions and sects. Article 4 is the article about languages, and

while it acknowledges that the only two official languages in Iraq at the statewide level are

Arabic and Kurdish, it also makes provisions that the Turkmen language and the Assyrian

language are two other official languages in the administrative units in which they

constitute density of population. So basically, in those areas where a sufficiently large

number of Turkmen live, there Turkmen can be recognized and used as an official language.

Article 14 is the general non-discrimination article in the Constitution. Article 125 is perhaps

more specifically important to members of non-majority communities – it guarantees

administrative, political, cultural and educational rights of the various nationalities, and

specifically mentions Turkmen among them.

Now what is a stark contrast here is the Constitution of the Kurdistan Region, which does

actually not explicitly recognize Turkmen as a constituent community of the Kurdish region.

But rather it notes in its Article 5 that the people of the Kurdistan region are composed of

Kurds, Arabs, Chaldo-Assyrian-Syriacs, Armenians and others who are citizens of Kurdistan.

In Article 20, the Kurdistan Region’s Constitution determines a sort of general equality in

front of the law and mandates non-discrimination on any grounds. Then there is an entire

chapter in the Kurdistan Region’s Constitution that is entitled ‘Ethnic and Religious Rights of

the Different Groups of the Kurdistan Region’, and I don’t want to go into much detail here,

but just to point out Article 35 actually mentions specifically the Turkmen as having a right

to national culture and administration autonomy wherever they represent a local majority

of the population. The only other thing that is noteworthy about the Kurdistan Regional

Constitution is Article 32, paragraph 2 which is actually a bit problematic from a minority

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rights perspective. I would to quote this article in order to prevent any misinterpretation or

misunderstanding. Article 32.2 states that:

‘‘The Government of the Kurdistan Region shall be committed to

preventing any intentional change in population percentages in the areas

inhabited by ethnic or religious groups. This shall not affect the process of

equitable restitution of the policies of Arabization and forced

displacement practiced by the Ba’athist regime in Iraqi-Kurdistan,

particularly in the city of Kerkuk.’’

What is noteworthy also about this is that Kerkuk is of course at the moment, at least before

any potential implementation of Article 140, not within the political boundaries of the

Kurdistan region.

Now all of that I think leaves me with a rather ambivalent conclusion here. On the one hand,

I think there is a relatively robust constitutional framework for minority rights in place in

both Iraq and in the Kurdistan region. But in the absence of proper implementation of these

relatively broad, and you might argue vague, constitutional provisions into actual law and

policy, the situation for Turkmen in Iraq is still rather precarious. It’s precarious in the sense

that there is still enough room for potential discrimination on ethnic, linguistic and religious

grounds. But also, there are very few incentives in the Iraqi legal framework actually to

prosecute violations of at least the latter, and of course also the spirit of the Constitution in

terms of protecting minority or identity communities in Iraq. But the most pressing problem,

and I want to conclude with this, is of course the security situation and as long as there is

still a remarkable lack of security almost ten years after the end of Saddam Hussein’s

regime, I think it’s an illusion to expect much progress on a better legal framework, on a

better policy framework for the situation of the Turkmen, but also for other identity

communities in Iraq.

Thank you very much.

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PUBLIC HEARING:

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INTRODUCTION

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

It is an honour to have with us a colleague from Iraq, Mr Hasan Özmen, Turkmen Member of

the Iraqi Parliament from the Diyala governorate. Having been active in Iraqi politics since

the late 1970s, partly from exile, his experiences since the American-led invasion in 2003,

from the perspective of a Turkmen and a fellow legislator and policymaker will be of

particular interest to us. Mr Özmen has also published a great number of books, articles and

reports over the years. Today Mr Özmen will speak in Turkish, for which we have

interpretation.

THE SITUATION OF THE TURKMEN OF IRAQ SINCE APRIL 2003

HASAN ÖZMEN

MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT

COUNCIL OF REPRESENTATIVES OF IRAQ

I am Hasan Özmen, member of the Iraqi Parliament from the Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF) and

the al-Iraqiya list. I would like to express my sincere appreciation to Mr. Metin Kazak and the

members of the Human Rights Subcommittee for the organization of such an important

meeting on the human rights situation of the Turkmen of Iraq.

According to census statistics, the validity of which are questionable, in 1957 Iraqi Turkmen

constituted 9% of Iraq’s total population. Had that population been allowed to grow at the

rate of the rest of Iraq, the Turkmen might now number in the millions. However, due to

gross acts of violence and degradation perpetrated over the past five decades, Turkmen

population growth has been stunted. Residing mainly in the north and middle of Iraq which

includes Mosul, Erbil, Salah al-Din, Diyala, Kut and Baghdad, the largest concentration of

Turkmen can be found in Kerkuk, the linguistic, cultural and ethnic identity of which has

been distinctly colored by their presence.

[1]

On April 10, 2003, after the US occupation, Kurdish forces entered traditional Turkmen

areas (including Tal Afer, Khanaqin and Kerkuk) and seized the administration of local

governments. Under pressure from this new Kurdish government, Turkmen, Assyrians and

Arabs were, and continue to be, subject to forced assimilation, intimidations, targeted

killings, arbitrary detentions, assassinations and kidnappings. As a result of these seizures

and the subsequent influx of Kurds, the demographic structure of the region has changed

completely.

Kerkuk is an oil-rich city in Northeastern Iraq. Because the city sits on almost 10 billion

barrels of oil, control of its administration and resources is highly contested.

[2]

Its

population, originally Turkmen, have suffered severely from assimilation, both during the

Ba’ath period and after U.S. occupation. Many Turkmen reside in the center of the province

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while Arabs live mainly in the south and west and the Kurdish population can be found in

the north and east. Due to its proximity to the center, the Turkmen populated region is the

area most exposed to terrorist activity.

As a result of the demographic shift seen in all lands seized by Kurdish forces, Kerkuk’s

council elections and most recent census are seen as fraudulent by Turkmen as they do not

accurately reflect Kerkuk’s population

.[3][4]

Violating laws issued by the Iraqi parliament, the

Kurds continue to dominate decision-making in the Kerkuk province.

In this context, Iraqi Turkmen call for the implementation of fair, free and transparent

elections organized according to international standards which demand:

1. Appointment of an United Nations commission to participate in the organization of

elections

2. Review and amendment of voter lists

In addition, the Turkmen of Iraq suggest that the Kerkuk province be administered for 10

years jointly by Turkmen, Arabs, Kurds and Christians.

Confiscation of land was one of the major features of the assimilation policies of the Ba’ath

regime. The total surface area of the lands confiscated in the Kerkuk region was

357,305,000 square meters, of which about 280 million square meters or 80%, was

Turkmen-owned. In spite of property legislation demanding the return of seized lands, very

little Turkmen land has been restored and very few Turkmen have been compensated for

these confiscated lands. Currently, there are 41,874 complaints registered with the Property

Claims Commission of Kerkuk. Of these complaints, only 3,236 cases have been decided,

while most cases remain in appellate court. To speed this process, the Iraqi Turkmen Front

presented a proposal to the Iraqi Parliament to regain these lands, but the proposal was

rejected due to Arabic opposition.

Turkmen education suffers from many difficulties in Iraq, and especially in the Kurdish

region. Large numbers of schools in Turkmen regions are still unable to use their mother

tongue. If Turkmen language is offered at all, it is limited to one subject. The major

difficulties within these schools are that a large percentage of teachers and all school

materials are not paid for by the Iraqi Ministry of Education. Teaching staff and facilities are

insufficient and there is shortage of experts and supervisors on Turkmen language and

literature.

Targeting of Iraqi Turkmen by terrorists has only increased since 2003. Since that point,

there have been hundreds of bombings and kidnappings in Turkmen regions.

For example, the Tal Afer district was attacked twice by helicopters, tanks and tens of

thousands of soldiers on 9 September 2004 and a year later, on 5 September 2005. I will

give you a picture of the attack by the numbers: 1,350 were left dead and 2,650 were

wounded; about 7,000 citizens were arrested and 1,000 are still in prison; 3,658 houses, 563

shops and 469 cars were damaged; about 500 houses were completely demolished and

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1,468 houses were robbed. During these catastrophes, about 48,000 families were displaced

from Tal Afer and 13,000 of those families are still unable to return to the region.

Iraqi Turkmen have also suffered severe repression in Erbil. In April 2005, Kurdish security

agents broke into Turkmen institutions and took over 24 buildings, including Turkmeneli

Television and Radio.

The Turkmen of Tuz Hurmatu suffer even more greatly under the oppressive Kurdish regime

because not only are they of Turkmen origin but they also practice Shiitism.

Since 2003, the total amount of ransom paid by Turkmen is estimated to be about 50 million

US dollars.

The goal of terrorism in Iraq is to hamper the institution of a democratic state and to

assimilate minority Iraqi communities such as the Turkmen, the Chaldea-Assyrians, the

Yazidis and the Shabaks.

The Turkmen of Iraq are suffering from genocide and ethnic cleansing; they are exposed to

daily violation of human rights, they have no physical and economic security and in many

cases have been forced to flee from their land.

We the Turkmen of Iraq support a unitary democratic state and would like to broker a

power sharing agreement in the Kerkuk province.

In view of the stated problems faced by the Turkmen in Iraq, I would kindly ask Mr. Metin

Kazak and the Human Rights Subcommittee of the European Parliament to:



Send a fact-finding mission to Turkmen areas of Iraq to investigate the human rights

situation

Consider organization of a meeting for Turkmen leaders with Mr. Herman Achille

Van Rompuy, the President of the Council of the European Union, Mr. Jerzy Buzek,

President of the European Parliament and Mr. José Manuel Durão Barroso,

President of the European Commission

Organize a presentation about the Iraqi Turkmen to the Foreign Affairs Commission

of the European Parliament

Support organization of a series of conferences in the European Parliament to

present the human rights situation of the Iraqi Turkmen.



------------------------------------------------------------

References:

Edward Y. Odisho, City of Kerkuk: No historical authenticity without multi-ethnicity.

North-eastern Illinois University, Chicago, IL U.S.A., Page 5 – 6.

Iraq Petroleum Company, http://almashriq.hiof.no/lebanon/300/380/388/ipc/

Provincial Councils Act No. 36, art. 23 adopted in 2008 prevented elections in Kerkuk,

which asked that the voters and electoral billets should be reviewed.

Article 16 of the Parliamentary Election Law Article 6, 2009

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INTRODUCTION

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

Our next guest speaker is Professor Ibrahim Sirkeci, professor of Transnational Studies and

Marketing and Director of the Regent’s Centre for Transnational Studies in the UK. He has

taught at a number of universities and is the author of numerous academic publications.

Specialising in demographic analysis, transnational mobility and ethnicity as some of his key

areas of research, his expertise is particularly appropriate today in helping explore the issue

of migration and the future security of the Iraqi Turkmen.

THE EFFECTS OF MIGRATION

AND THE FUTURE SECURITY OF THE IRAQI TURKMEN

PROFESSOR IBRAHIM SIRKECI

DIRECTOR

CENTRE FOR TRANSNATIONAL STUDIES, REGENT’S COLLEGE

Chair, thank you; honourable members, ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon,

Thank you for the invitation. [...] I have been studying ethnic minorities, ethnic minorities in

conflict situations and their international mobility for years and based on that I proposed a

model on migration how to understand international human mobility in such conflict

situations. Obviously in the original model, I am looking at and discussing a wide range of

conflicts which involves quite latent tensions but on the other extreme wars, armed clashes

and so on. Human migration is apparently responsive to conflicts in any area around the

world and we have found so much evidence across the world including Iraq with the

Turkmen Kurdish cases and also other minority cases mentioned already. In Lebanon, in

Syria, in Mexico, in Turkey and you can find more examples to support the idea and the

hypotheses there.

The Turkmen habitat in mostly northern Iraq has been part of a conflict zone for decades, if

not longer. In similar conflict situations around the world and in the region, we have seen

upsurges of immigration, of outmigration. For example after the conflict we have seen a

sharp increase in the number of people seeking asylum in Germany and other European

countries. We have seen similar sharp increases in Ethiopia to Europe again regarding

Eritrean conflict. We have seen similar increases from Turkey to Germany regarding Kurdish

conflict and from Iraq to Turkey and other European countries regarding Kurdish conflicts or

Saddam’s oppression of Kurdish minorities. Unlike the Kurdish, we have not heard much

about the Turkmen minority but one important feature in all of these cases was that

migration flows were not limited to the peak periods of the respective conflict situations but

we have identified a period following the major conflict period of continuous outward

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migration of those minority groups. So we are not referring to just mass refugee or asylum

seeking flows. In my studies I have observed similar outflows of Turkmen from Iraq.

Another key feature is that while violent conflicts as we detect them are contributing to

human insecurity as we call it, the human insecurity has two components: one is material

and the other is non-material. You can easily find material indicators such as lack of job

opportunities or increased life-threatening risks, persecution, death toll, etc. Whereas non-

material is mainly referring to cultural rights and other forms of discrimination and human

rights abuses. In the Iraqi Turkmen case we can easily identify such incidences. Arabisation

policies already mentioned is such important life threatening, both material and non-

material, elements in the environment of human insecurity.

Individuals and families that are faced with such conditions have options available to them.

One such option is migration to another country. They may stay where they are or walk out

of places they reside. Iraqi Turkmen with other ethnic groups have gone through several

wars and invasions which are all part and parcel of that environment of human insecurity as

we define. Here we see the change in stock of immigrant Iraqis in OECD countries after the

2003 invasion. There is almost a 50% rise between 2000 and 2006 and to a large extent, we

can credit this to the invasion. Iraqi asylum-seeking applications to industrialised countries

have risen from about 275,000 to over 400,000 during the 2000s, so within a decade we

have seen almost a double of the total numbers of asylum seekers.

Such reactions to armed conflicts are most visible with changes in refugee and asylum

seeking flows. In Iraq we have seen such peak periods marked by sharp increases in asylum

applications during the 1990s and 2000s. [These include…] key events as such, like in 1988

we had chemical attacks on the Kurdish, in 1990 and 1991 first Iraq War and first Iraqi

invasion of Kuwait, whatever you want to call it, then in 1998 we have seen Operation

Desert Fox and in 2002 and 2003 we had weapons inspections and surrounding tensions

followed by the allied forces’ invasion. In 2006 sectarian violence broke out in the country,

something which I believe is not solved yet. Turkmen emigration from Iraq is therefore not

much different than other Iraqi groups. As you can see from these two graphs, they share a

very similar pattern. I tried to correspond the dates between 1980 to 2004, which was the

time I carried out field research in Iraq with the help of about 60 Iraqi research assistants.

In our study we collected information about the year of last migration and we did that for

current and returned migrants, so to draw this graph to represent Iraqi emigration. I am not

claiming these events have only affected Turkmen, but it seems evident that they caused a

large-scale displacement relative to this particular group’s population. The proportion of

families with migrant members is higher than compared to other emigration source

countries or sending countries. It amounts to about 35% or 36% of all households and more

than 10% of all individuals. So at the time of the study, it is three times higher than the Iraqi

averages which tells us only one thing – this particular community is suffering more than

others in the same situation. In our survey in Iraq we found that about 60% of Iraqi Turkmen

believed that migration would improve their cultural and political freedoms, and then about

40% considered terror and conflicts as main reasons for moving abroad. This goes up to 60%

when political reasons are also added to the total. Further, 38%, that is about two-fifths,

mentioned avoiding military service as their main reason for migration.

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Iraqi Turkmen and other minorities are not homogenous groups regarding their religion and

languages. That is important to note because this was a mistake as far as I have seen and I

have spotted it also in political debates since the invasion. There are Sunni, Shi’ite and other

religious groups within Turkmen, and most Turkmen speak Arabic, Turkman and some of

them speak Kurdish so we should realise and understand there is to a certain extent a mixed

community with mixed identities as well so trying to build a new Iraq based on either ethnic

or religious identities would be a mistake. High levels of out-migration shrinks the share of

Iraqi Turkmen in the rural population in Iraq, hence reduces political representation and

opportunity for that particular group. There are sizable communities of Iraqi Turkmen in

Turkey and other European communities but these are not recognized in all countries and

therefore there is a need for recognition and documentation, so they can vote in Iraqi

elections and they can contribute. There should also be some action to ensure these

diaspora communities, if they wish, can go back to their homelands.

A high level of migration often means that many Turkmen have not been and will not be

able to take part and contribute to the rebuilding of Iraq after the invasion. In theory, as I

mentioned earlier, I expect the outflow of Iraqi Turkmen will continue beyond the key

events or major conflicts in the country and therefore we don’t know the actual size of

displaced Iraqi Turkmen within and outside Iraq.

Finally I would like to say that long term hostilities and conflicts between ethnic and

religious groups in Iraq are flourishing on the political system, which is largely based on

ethnic and religious divisions. This is in my opinion a recipe for disaster in countries with

mixed ethno-religious populations. A democratic system securing ethnic and religious rights

and sanctioning discrimination is the only peaceful solution for Turkmen and other ethnic

minorities in Iraq.

Thank you very much for listening.

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INTRODUCTION

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

In order to provide some insight into the EU’s policy on the matter, we are happy to

welcome the EEAS Representative, Mr. Dominic Porter, Deputy Head of Division, Arabian

Peninsula, Iran, Iraq.

RESPONSE FROM EEAS

DOMINIC PORTER

DEPUTY HEAD (ARABIAN PENINSULA, IRAN, IRAQ)

EUROPEAN EXTERNAL ACTION SERVICE (EEAS)

Thank you very much and good afternoon to everybody, thank you Madam Chair and thank

you to all our speakers.

The event today, as everybody has pointed out, is an extremely timely and extremely

important opportunity to raise awareness to the situation of the Turkmen populations in

Iraq as well as those who have left. We have heard rather worrying messages and some

slightly more hopeful messages. I have heard a number of speakers including of course Mr.

Özmen with his description of the long standing discrimination and suffering and the plight

of the Turkmen populations in northern Iraq which reminds us here in Europe of the

problems that we have had ourselves on our doorsteps during the 1990s and that of course

we risk having just a little further afield in Iraq amongst other countries and in particular in

what is often called the powder keg of Iraq which is the city of Kerkuk. What I have heard,

which has been more appealing or at least more reassuring, is the desire that has been

expressed by the speakers, and particularly by Mr. Özmen, to build a stable and a peaceful

multicultural community around the area of Kerkuk, to seek […] solutions through dialogue;

that is very much the view that we share.

This is an event of awareness raising. It is important that we raise our own [awareness]

across the EU, the EEAS and the European Parliament; [that] we raise our own level of

vigilance; that we raise our readiness to help where we can, and if need be, that we raise

our voice in defence of Turkmen and indeed any minorities which are the victims of

discrimination. As you know, at the level of the EU we have been doing our best, in very

difficult circumstances it must be said, to promote the long term stability of Iraq and one of

the fundamental things that stability depends upon is reconciling sometimes competing

impulses. The impulse of course to build a functioning but unified inclusive stable state, and

the need of course to account for the diverse groups and regions within that state. These

competing impulses must become complementary. As I said before, we as Europeans are as

aware as anybody, if not more, about how important it is to turn diversity into a positive

force and not a negative one. Having said that, I shall not pretend that we have all the

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answers. All I can say again is that dialogue rather than defiance should probably be the

guiding principle.

What do we do in the EU? I will run very quickly through it because in this Committee you

know very well essentially the stance that the EU has on human rights issues. Generally on

the issue of protection of minorities, we have three basic ways that we try to approach the

subject: either through bilateral dialogue with the authorities in Iraq where we have an on-

going conversation with the embassy here, through our Delegation with the authorities

locally and of course through the reform of political dialogue between the EU and Iraq

which we hope will become more regular, more frequent and more deep as the partnership

and cooperation agreement is signed. We also use multilateral fora as you all know very

well. I will simply mention the United Nations fora - the Human Rights Council and recall in

this context the recommendation which was made and agreed to by the Government of Iraq

at the February 2010 Universal Periodic Review of Iraq. As you know every country is

subjected to that review where the government has agreed now to and I quote:

‘Ensure the rights of religious and ethnic minorities. In this regard, respect and guarantee

the rights of Iraqi Turkmen and other peoples who are integral with Iraq in accordance with

relevant international obligation’

We heard about those obligations as well as the constitutional obligation under Article 125

of the Iraqi Constitution.

The third thing apart from dialogue and multilateral fora is of course cooperation, assistance

and help. I won’t go through the long list of things that the EU has done or is continuing to

do but I should mention that we are funding, if you like, human rights at a systemic level

through support to the new independent national Human Rights Commission for example.

We have a longstanding rule of law mission, the EUJUST LEX mission, in Iraq that tries to

promote the rule of law more widely as a sort of founding principle of a stable and just

nation. We also have some very specific activities, for example in Kerkuk we have provided

support for the Kerkuk Centre for the Victims of Torture under the EIDHR. So there are

various ways in which we try to help.

Many people raised the issue of security. I receive text messages from the EU Situation

Centre, and should mention that 16 Shi’a were just killed in Hillah City in Iraq in the last hour

or two. This I’m afraid is still a virtually daily occurrence that there is violence of a sectarian

nature, violence of an ethnic nature and the security situation, whilst of course it has

stabilised since the low points in 2006 and 2007, is still extremely fragile and I think Iraq is

one of the cases, if not the case, where this sort of nexus between security, human rights

and development is at its most essential and vividly illustrated.

Many have raised the subject of Kerkuk and the disputed territories. I will finish just by

saying a couple of words on that. Kerkuk is an incredibly difficult and complex place, even in

Iraqi terms so certainly in global terms. The United Nations (UN) and the United Nations

Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) has been working on, if you like, the implementation of

Article 140 of the constitution, making Article 140 work for a number of years and the EU

has been supporting that work throughout and where it can. At the moment, the lead

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remains with the UN and I think it is right that it does. But we stand ready to help as and

when requested. What they have been seeking to do, and admittedly I think there has been

something of a hiatus in their work over the last six months to one year, but what they are

trying to do is to facilitate a productive dialogue and we will be meeting the day after

tomorrow [7 December 2011] with Martin Kobler who is the new Special Representative of

the UN in Iraq, and asking for his latest update on what he declared himself to be his

number one priority actually in Iraq which is addressing the problem of the disputed

territories.

I will stop there because I see that it’s your forum and it’s for the Members to discuss as

much as they can. Thank you very much indeed.

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DISCUSSION

FRIEDA BREPOELS MEP

MEMBER

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Thank you Madam Chair,

I would like to thank all the speakers for the interesting presentations they have made. I

would like to ask a number of specific questions.

I heard with interest Mr. Wolff’s presentation. He spoke about the Iraqi Constitution and

also the Kurdish Regional Constitution, and the issue of minority rights in that text and I

believe in general terms that everything is written there into the constitution but

unfortunately nothing has been done on the ground at a political level. That is the first

question.

My second question concerns the possibilities of using the Turkmen language. You said at

one point that if one can show that there is enough Turkmen who live in a particular area,

then that language will be able to be used as an official language but that hasn’t really been

defined. What is meant by sufficient? I’d like some figures there.

I have another question on the region and city of Kerkuk. Mr. Özmen says that Kerkuk is not

part of Kurdistan, that has been settled, but that Article 140 of the Constitution says that a

referendum should be organised on the question. Now as far as I can tell this referendum

has not taken place yet. Is that something that is planned for the future or will it not be

done at all? What do you see happening down the track there?

Now the final thing I’d like to raise concerns the EEAS. I would like to know, with regard to

the partnership agreement, in which the Commission made a proposal a few years ago and

it’s still in the pipeline as it has not got through the Council. At the European Parliament

level we have debated it some time ago now but unfortunately there is no progress on the

issue; we can’t seem to get the thing off the ground. How does the EEAS see the future work

with regard to this subject?

Thank you.

* * * *

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STRUAN STEVENSON MEP

CHAIR

DELEGATION FOR RELATIONS WITH IRAQ

Thank you very much Madam Chair, and thank you very much to the speakers for their

presentations.

I think what all of the presentations have helped to focus on is the current situation inside

Iraq. The Americans are leaving at the end of this year and are telling the world that they

are leaving behind a functioning democracy that this is a model for the Middle East and the

Arab Spring to follow. Indeed when I was in Baghdad in April [2011] some of the

government ministers I met said to me that the Arab Spring is a reaction to the freedom and

democracy that we have achieved here. They want it and the rest of the Middle East. Well I

have to say God help the Middle East if they achieve the functioning democracy that the

Americans have left behind in Iraq. We have just heard of another 16 people killed today.

The security situation is dire. There were only four hours of electricity a day in Baghdad and

many of the citizens don’t have access to clean water. There is massive unemployment. It is

a shambles and a broken country thanks to America, Britain and the other countries that

intervened there.

It was of course great to get rid of Saddam, a dictator. But what have we put in place instead

of Saddam? We have a coalition government formed under the so-called Erbil Agreement.

Virtually none of the conditions of that agreement, none of the articles have been

implemented. The key ministries of frontier security and defence still are held within the

Prime Minister’s office, giving him massive power and the result is we see the discrimination

and the hostility towards minorities, including sizable amounts of the population like the

Turkmen, that are continuing unabated.

You know I spoke in Beirut a few weeks ago at a conference on the oppression of minorities

in the Middle East and there was a lot of the conference focused on Iraq, and I mentioned in

my speech how since the fall of Saddam, the Christian minority in Iraq of 1.5 million has

virtually been decimated. There are now around 450,000. The Turkmen, Professor Wolff

said that no one is sure whether there are two million or only 600,000 because of the

internal displacement, the external displacement and the fact that they have been

discriminated against and the theft and confiscation of their land and property. This is

happening to sizeable chunks of the population, not just minorities and this is happening

across Iraq.

The first thing I have to say is that the government in Iraq needs to get its act together. They

have now got oil production back to Saddam levels, they have massive resources and the

resources don’t seem to be spent properly on the population. The second thing I want to say

is there is continuing interference in the internal affairs by the neighbouring countries,

notably Iran. Iran is a malign influence on the geopolitical stability of the whole Middle East,

never mind Iraq, so that must stop. The third thing that I would say is our presence, the

EEAS presence, we have appointed our former colleague Jana Hybášková as the Ambassador

who is going a great job, but she has a skeleton staff. Most of her staff are located in Jordan

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and Oman. We have an enormous staff in Afghanistan but because of the cost of security we

have a tiny staff in pathetic little offices that we rent from the British Embassy in Baghdad.

We need to beef up the EEAS presence in Baghdad and we need to open an EEAS office in

Erbil. Kurdistan is the only part of Iraq where there is economic growth, where there is

stability and where there is something to be proud of because they have sealed the border

with 130,000 Peshmerga to stop the infiltration of any terrorists into the KRG territory. This

is an example to the rest of Iraq and I wish that Iraq would follow that example.

Thank you very much.

* * * *

JUAN KHIOKA

SECOND SECRETARY

EMBASSY OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF IRAQ

Thank you Madam Chairperson,

I will be very brief in my intervention and concentrate on our Constitution which is our way

to solve our problems domestically in Iraq. Allow me to thank you for organising this

meeting and to welcome all distinguished Members of Parliament and guests. My

Delegation took note of what has been said at the meeting and would like to highlight the

following notes:

We would like to confirm that the new Iraq guarantees for all Iraqis, including its minorities

equal rights before the law. This right is stipulated in the Constitution approved

democratically by the Iraqis in the 2005 referendum. The fundamental principles in the Iraqi

Constitution states in Article 3 that Iraq is a country of multiple nationalities, religions and

sects.

In Article 4, the Constitution ensures the right of all Iraqis to educate their children in their

mother tongue, such as Turkmen, Assyrian and Armenian in government educational

institutions and in any other language in private educational institutions. The Iraqi

Constitution also guarantees civil and political rights for all Iraqis without discrimination

linked to nationality, origin, race, gender, religion or opinion. The Constitution ensures the

administrative, political, cultural and educational rights to the various nationalities such as

Turkmen, Caldanese, Assyrians and all other constituents, and this shall be guaranteed by

law.

In the new Iraq for the first time all minorities have the right to have their representatives in

the House of Representatives and the right to express their concerns and have their voice

heard through peaceful means. In case of any legal disputes or differences in opinions, the

Iraqi constitution enshrines the domestic remedies to solve them through the legal and

constitutional institutions.

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* * * *

PROFESSOR STEFAN WOLFF

PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY

UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

Thank you very much for your questions. I want to keep my answer brief because your two

questions are very closely linked and there is not that much to say.

Yes, you are absolutely right, there is a very good constitutional framework in place as far as

constitutional frameworks go. But you don’t actually have any implementation legislation so

there is no in a sense comprehensive human rights or minority rights law. To the extent that

you have individual laws that take account of human and minority rights issues, they are

sometimes ambivalent in terms of how they can be interpreted and that goes very much to

the core about the issue of language use. Yes, I can only give you what the Iraqi Constitution

says because there is no minority rights or minority language law so we don’t actually know

what exactly that means. If a particular community lives locally in a density, is that 10%, 20%

or 30%? So I think that from that perspective there is a practical legal matter that at some

point in the future, this needs to be codified. But what I can say from my own experience

with the different population groups in Kerkuk, locally there is a genuine effort to translate

these fairly vague provisions of Article 4 of the Iraqi Constitution into some real practice. So

in Kerkuk for example, there is now an effort to have official languages, not just Kurdish and

Arabic but also Turkman. To have names of streets, places and buildings in three languages.

But then there is already a problem of what script do you use. So there are lots of things

that even where there is goodwill, it is very difficult actually to come up with a proper

framework because of a lack of implementation legislation.

The other question that you raised about Article 140, well again it’s not clear. Theoretically

the period until which Article 140 was to be implemented has expired; that was the end of

December 2007. But by the same token if you say well that has expired now and it was not

implemented, does that mean that the 2005 Constitution is now invalid? What are the

follow-on consequences of that? I think the most difficult issue is not so much the situation

in Kerkuk where the local communities have found a way of trying to coexist with each

other, it’s the outside influences. Kerkuk is in many ways a pawn between Baghdad and Erbil

and to some extent also other regional interests in that. So I really don’t think there is any

very clear or straightforward solution in particular in the absence of a genuine willingness of

all parties to compromise and I think this is also very much what was said by the EEAS – you

can’t resolve an issue as complex as that by simply pointing, well Article 140 we haven’t had

it yet or Article 140, it’s long past the deadline. There needs to be genuine compromise on

this issue.

* * * *

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

HASAN ÖZMEN

MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT

COUNCIL OF REPRESENTATIVES OF IRAQ

Thank you Madam Chair.

Concerning Article 140 and the question that was asked, there are three stages that are part

of Article 140. There is normalisation and then there is a census and the third stage is a

referendum. We haven’t gone from the first to the second stage yet and the reason for that

is that the demographic changes under Saddam have not been adapted [to correct these

changes]. We think that we need to take into account what happened before 2003 and what

happened after 2003, and the demographic changes over that period before moving onto

the census which I have just talked to you about. We have mentioned this to the relevant

authorities and ministries, the statistical authorities, and the reasons I have just mentioned,

we haven’t had the census yet and if circumstances permitted if there were a normalisation,

which we are not against – we want there to be a normalisation, and the demographic

diversity be taken into account prior to 2003 and after 2003 in order to be able to organise a

census.

Madam Chair, I would also like to add that the Kurdish Constitution is in the draft stage. It’s

not a final document. We have a range of proposals that we are still looking at with regards

to that constitution. As regards languages and the laws concerning linguistic diversity, these

laws will be debated in the Parliament and is to be adopted by the Parliament in the coming

months. The Turkmen and the Syriacs will be able to use their own language in those

regions where they live. As regards density, we have asked for a definition of what is meant

by a sufficient density. The Constitutional Council has said that it involves a sufficiently

visible presence of the ethnic group, so this is a draft law which is before the Parliament, a

draft law that we will contribute to in terms of its drafting and we will be able to speak our

own languages.

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

CLOSING REMARKS

BARBARA LOCHBIHLER MEP

CHAIR

SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS

Thank you to all the guests and experts for their very good analysis and also their political

demands. I thank my colleague Mr. Kazak for taking the initiative to have this hearing. I take

it for granted that Mr. Stevenson within the work of the Iraq Delegation will follow the

situation of the Turkmen minority and I think his point that the EU Delegation in Iraq is so

small, I think three and a half staff, this needs our attention too. I hope that the EEAS also

looks more into detail in the situation of the Turkmen. I think that several times now it has

been raised that there is expertise needed on how to carry out a census. That could perhaps

be supported from this side as well. So thank you again. With a report of this meeting, we

will also present to our enlarged Bureau and the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Today's hearing offered the possibility to hear from academic experts and experts 'on the

ground' as it were, about an area and a group of people who seem to be forgotten in

broader debates about the region.

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PUBLIC HEARING:

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PHOTOGRAPHS

(l-r) Metin Kazak MEP, Professor Ibrahim Sirkeci, Secretary of the

Commission, Barbara Lochbihler MEP, Professor Stefan Wolff, Hasan Özmen

Professor Ibrahim Sirkeci

Hasan Özmen

Barbara Lochbihler MEP

Professor Stefan Wolff

Metin Kazak MEP

Representatives from the Iraqi Embassy in Brussels

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PUBLIC HEARING:

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PUBLIC HEARING:

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SPEAKER BIOGRAPHIES

KAZAK, Metin

Bulgarian MEP in the Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE),

Metin Kazak MEP currently serves as Vice-Chair to the Subcommittee on Human Rights of

the European Parliament. He is also a member of the European Parliament’s Committee on

International Trade, and of the Delegation to the EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee.

Prior to his election to the European Parliament, Mr. Kazak served on the Council of

Ministers of the Republic of Bulgaria between 2000-2001, and was head of cabinet of a

minister without portfolio in the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Bulgaria between

2001-2005.

LOCHBIHLER, Barbara

Chair of the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights and Member of the

European Parliament’s Conference of Committee Chairs, Barbara Lochbihler is a German

MEP in the Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance. Before her election to the

European Parliament, Ms. Lochbihler served as a personal parliamentary liaison officer in

the Bavarian Regional Assembly for the Greens Parliamentary Party between 1987 and

1991. She also held the position of General Secretary for Amnesty International Germany

between 1999 and 2009, and as General Secretary for the Women's International League for

Peace and Freedom between 1992 and 1999.

Ms. Lochbihler is a founding member of the German Human Rights Institute (Berlin) and of

the Human Rights Foundation (Berlin). She also serves as a member of the Board of

Trustees for the Roland Berger Foundation (Munich), and is a member of the German

UNICEF Committee.

ÖZMEN, Hasan

Co-founder of National Turkmen Party, Hasan Suliman Özmen currently serves as a Turkmen

Member of the Iraqi Parliament, representing the Diyala Governorate Community in

northern Iraq. Prior to his election to the Iraqi Parliament, Mr. Özmen served as a member

of the Iraqi National Congress from 1992-2003. During his tenure in this position, he

participated in the Iraqi National Opposition in Beirut, as well as co-founding both the Iraqi

Turkmen Front, for which he currently serves as Head of Information, and the Turkmen Eli

Foundation, which provides humanitarian assistance to Turkmen in Iraq.

Mr. Özmen has also participated in meetings held by Human Rights Committee in General

Council in Geneva, as well as written various publications on the Turkmen.

PORTER, Dominic

Current Deputy Head of the Division for the Arabian Peninsula, Iran and Iraq, which is part

of the Geographical, Multilateral and Global Affairs Departments of the European External

Action Service.

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

SIRKECI, Ibrahim

Director of the Centre for Transnational Studies at Regent’s College in London, Ibrahim

Sirkeci has previously worked as an assistant professor in Ankara, Turkey and later as a

Leverhulme Research Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Ethnicity and Citizenship at the

University of Bristol. In addition to his current position at Regent’s College, he serves as

managing editor of

Migration Letters,

an international scholarly journal which focuses on

the study of migration and population and associate editor at

Border Crossing:

Transnational Working Papers in Higher Education.

Sirkeci’s research is currently concentrated on marketing segmentation, transnational

consumers and ethnic marketing, and in 2011, he contributed to a publication by the World

Bank entitled

Migration and Remittances during the Global Financial Crisis and Beyond,

which analysed recent trends in remittance flows and the effect their probable decline could

have on the current global economic milieu. He has also served as a consultant to the World

Bank, Euromonitor and the European Commission.

WOLFF, Stefan

Professor of International Security at the University of Birmingham, Stefan Wolff specializes

in conflict settlement and post-conflict reconstruction. Professor Wolff has acted as a

consultant in this capacity during conflicts in the Balkans, Northern Ireland and the former

Soviet Union. In 2003, he served as an expert consultant on three rounds of negotiations on

power sharing arrangements in Kerkuk, Iraq.

Currently, Wolff is an advisor in settlement discussions between Transnistria and Moldova,

as well as a member of the Governing Council of the European Centre for Minority Issues

and an International Associate at the Liechtenstein Institute on Self-determination at

Princeton University. He is the founding editor or Ethnopolitics, a scholarly journal dedicated

to conflict and resolution study, and has published thirty six publications which include

sixteen books. Among numerous honours, in 2006, Wolff was awarded the UK Defence

Academy’s Distinguished Visiting Fellowship.

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

MEDIA COVERAGE

December 5, 2011 – Timeturk:

Iraklı Türkmenlerin sorunları AP'de ele alındı

http://www.timeturk.com/tr/2011/12/05/irakli-turkmenlerin-sorunlari-ap-de-ele-

alindi.html

December 5, 2011 – Türkiye Gazetesi:

Iraklı Türkmenler, AB'de derman arıyor

http://www.turkiyegazetesi.com.tr/haberdetay.aspx?NewsID=436

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

December 7, 2011 – Telgraf Turk:

APde Iraklı Türkmenler tartışıldı

http://www.telgrafturk.com/dunya/apde-irakli-turkmenler-tartisildi-h24086.html

December 11 - 17, 2011 - EU World:

Iraq's minorities need action from EU

http://www.neurope.eu/article/iraqs-minorities-need-action-eu

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

APPENDIX I

TIMELINE OF EVENTS

The following timeline chronicles the situation for the Turkmen community in Iraq from

2003 until 2011. It represents only an overview but reflects the political, security and social

developments to have taken place and affect Iraqi Turkmen communities over this

timeframe. The source articles can be located by following the highlighted and embedded

web links.

2003

March

In advance of international intervention in Iraq, Turkmen groups call for any

resulting regime change to lead to

proportional representation

in a

parliamentary state based on democracy.

Iraqi Turkmen Front expresses desire for United States to ensure new

institutions are

rooted in democratic and inclusive principles.

Turkmen representatives

call for a census

that can accurately identify

Turkmen population after decades of Ba’athist Arabisation policies.

May

2004

September

Turkish Government

condemns military operations

by Coalition forces that

leave scores of Turkmen citizens dead in Tel Afar.

2005

March

Turkmen and Arabs largely

boycott parliamentary elections,

with Kurdish

parties subsequently securing majorities in Kerkuk and elsewhere.

Iraq’s 2005 Constitution

includes Article 140 that calls for a census and

referendum to decide the status of disputed areas such as Kerkuk.

2006

August

Turkmen

demonstrate in Kerkuk

calling for recognition of their rights as a

population group

2007

May

Controversy over the status of Kerkuk leads to delays on finding agreement to

constitutional amendments as

talks stall.

Increase in tensions,

as elections in Kerkuk are delayed further. According to a

directive, the proposed election, which had been due to take place 15

November, is now supposed to take place by the end of the year.

November

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December

Deadline for a referendum that is intended, under

Article 140 of the Iraqi

Constitution,

to resolve the status of disputed areas such as Kerkuk.

2008

December

restaurant bombing in Kerkuk

leaves almost fifty dead and over a hundred

injured, mostly Kurds.

UNAMI report reiterates that

Turkmen and minority communities remain

targets

for assassination.

2009

January

The

festival of Ashura is marked in Kerkuk

by Turkmen and Arabs amid high

security, including military helicopters.

A fact-finding mission to Kerkuk, organised by the Iraqi parliament,

ends in

failure.

Death toll reaches over seventy, following a

truck bomb in Kerkuk.

Car bomb detonates killing at least twenty-five people in Kerkuk, following the

handover of the city

from US forces to domestic forces.

May

June

July

Bomb attacks leave at least

thirty four dead and seventy injured

in the city of

Tal Afar.

Tamin Province, of which Kerkuk is the capital, is

excluded from provincial

elections

over fears that violence will erupt.

August

Iraq

abandons plans to hold its first census

in twenty years, due to fears it

might increase tensions among Arab and Kurdish groups.

Decision on the date for Iraq’s general election is prolonged as

tensions

between communities in Kerkuk and other disputed areas continue,

particularly over the issue of updated voter rolls.

Suicide bomber kills and wounds tens of people

in an attack on Friday Prayers

in Tal Afar.

October

December

A total of

226 people were killed

as a result of bombings in Kerkuk during

2009, while a further 675 were wounded.

2010

January

Joint patrols of Arab and Kurdish troops

begin amid opposition from

politicians in disputed areas such as Kerkuk.

Budget allocation for Kerkuk

criticised as being too meagre

to support the

region.

February

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February

Reports emerge in which General Raymond Odierno, Commander of US

Forces in Iraq,

calls upon the retention of a US brigade to remain in Kerkuk

amidst ongoing tensions.

Parliamentary elections see coalitions of Arab and Turkmen

political parties

reversing earlier majorities

held by Kurdish parties in an election noted for its

peaceful nature.

Following a successful alliance with the nationalist Al-Iraqiyah list of former

Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, the Iraqi Turkmen have

expressed new hope for

their political future.

Iraqi Turkmen Front strongly

criticises an attack on a local councillor’s house

in Kerkuk.

Amidst the election to the Kurdistan presidency, Masud Barzani

stresses need

to follow Article 140,

despite opposition from Baghdad and serious concern

expressed by the UN.

Iraqi Arab and Turkmen leaders

appeal for increased security in Kerkuk.

March

April

June

July

August

Prime Minister Al-Maliki and President Barzani meet with observers

hoping

the occasion will see moves to a resolution of the disputes between

communities in Northern Iraq.

Car bomb damages Christian church

in Kerkuk that leaves a priest injured and

the church closed.

October

Plans for a census

as a step to resolving the status of Kerkuk is postponed to

December amid ongoing disagreements between communities in the region.

Three car bombs explode,

targeting the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan in Kerkuk.

The Kurdistan Alliance

threatens it will not participate in the new Iraqi

cabinet,

unless a paper outlining its nineteen demands is signed.

Proposed census due to take place in Kerkuk is cancelled

amid ongoing

disputes over the city’s status.

November

December

2011

January

Iraqi Turkmen Front

appeals to the Iraqi government to put an end to the

violent attacks

against innocent civilians.

Bomb attacks target police and Kurdish security services

in Kerkuk, leaving

seven dead.

February

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PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

March

Peshmerga deployment to Kerkuk

to prevent terrorist attacks sparks

controversy and some calls for a power-sharing agreement between the city’s

communities.

One hundred people killed or wounded

in worst bomb attack to target police

and civilians in Kerkuk in two months.

Turkmen demonstrate in Kerkuk

in the latest of protests calling for the return

of village land appropriated and redistributed by the Ba’athist regime.

Head of UNAMI declares Kerkuk one of its

top three priorities

following the

withdrawal of US forces.

Kerkuk Provincial Council member

confirms withdrawal of US forces

within

days from Kerkuk.

Additional battalion created

to join the Golden Lion Forces composed of three

battalions of Iraqi Army, Kurdish Peshmerga, and Kerkuk Police units.

Turkmen MP is amongst minority deputies

abstaining from a vote in the

Kurdistan Parliament

in protest at amendments to election laws that are seen

to compromise minority communities.

May

October

November

December

First hearing of the Iraqi Turkmen

convenes at the European Parliament.

Governor of Kerkuk announces

allocation of funds

for the development of the

Kerkuk region.

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APPENDIX II

KEY LEGAL DOCUMENTS

-The Iraqi Constitution

Article 3:

Iraq is a country of multiple nationalities, religions, and sects. It is a founding and active

member in the Arab League and is committed to its charter, and it is part of the Islamic

world.

Article 4:

First: The Arabic language and the Kurdish language are the two official languages of Iraq.

The right of Iraqis to educate their children in their mother tongue, such as Turkmen, Syriac,

and Armenian shall be guaranteed in government educational institutions in accordance

with educational guidelines, or in any other language in private educational institutions.

Second: The scope of the term “official language” and the means of applying the provisions

of this article shall be defined by a law and shall include:

A. Publication of the Official Gazette, in the two languages;

B. Speech, conversation, and expression in official domains, such as the Council of

Representatives, the Council of Ministers, courts, and official conferences, in either

of the two languages;

C. Recognition and publication of official documents and correspondence in the two

languages;

D. Opening schools that teach the two languages, in accordance with the educational

guidelines;

E. Use of both languages in any matter enjoined by the principle of equality such as

bank notes, passports, and stamps.

Third: The federal and official institutions and agencies in the Kurdistan region shall use both

languages.

Fourth: The Turkomen language and the Syriac language are two other official languages in

the administrative units in which they constitute density of population.

Fifth: Each region or governorate may adopt any other local language as an additional

official language if the majority of its population so decides in a general referendum.

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Article 14:

Iraqis are equal before the law without discrimination based on gender, race, ethnicity,

nationality, origin, color, religion, sect, belief or opinion, or economic or social status.

Article 125:

This Constitution shall guarantee the administrative, political, cultural, and educational

rights of the various nationalities, such as Turkomen, Chaldeans, Assyrians, and all other

constituents, and this shall be regulated by law.

Article 140:

First: The executive authority shall undertake the necessary steps to complete the

implementation of the requirements of all subparagraphs of Article 58 of the Transitional

Administrative Law.

Second: The responsibility placed upon the executive branch of the Iraqi Transitional

Government stipulated in Article 58 of the Transitional Administrative Law shall extend and

continue to the executive authority elected in accordance with this Constitution, provided

that it accomplishes completely (normalization and census and concludes with a

referendum in Kerkuk and other disputed territories to determine the will of their citizens),

by a date not to exceed the 31st of December 2007.

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PUBLIC HEARING:

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-Kurdistan Regional Constitution of 2009

Article 5:

First: The people of the Kurdistan Region are composed of Kurds, Turkmens, Arabs,

Chaldo-Assyrian-Syriacs, Armenians and others who are citizens of Kurdistan.

Article 20: Equality

First: All are equal before the law.

Second: All forms of discrimination on the basis of race, color, sex, language, social

background, nationality, origin, religion, belief, thought, age, social, political or economic

status, or handicap are prohibited. The principle of equality shall not prevent redressing the

effects and consequences of past injustice perpetrated by former regimes against the

citizens of Kurdistan-Iraq and its ethnic, religious and linguistic groups.

Third: Men and women shall be equal before the law. The Government of the Region must

seek to remove all obstacles hindering equality in all spheres of life, and in civil, political,

social, cultural and economic rights. The Government of the Region guarantees that all shall

enjoy their rights, as stipulated in this Constitution and the international charters signed by

the State of Iraq.

Article 35:

This Constitution guarantees ethnic, cultural and administrative rights to the Turkmen, the

Arabs, the Chaldeans, the Syriacs, the Assyrians, and the Armenians, including autonomy,

wherever any of those components represent a majority of the population.

This shall be regulated by law.

Article 32.2:

Second: The Government of the Kurdistan Region shall be committed to preventing any

intentional change in population percentages in the areas inhabited by ethnic or religious

groups. This shall not affect the process of removing the effects of the policies of

Arabization and forced displacement practiced by the Ba’athist regime in the city of Kerkuk

and other areas of Kurdistan-Iraq.

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-International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights

Article 27:

In those States in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to

such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other members of their

group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practise their own religion, or to use their

own language

-ILO Convention 111 concerning Discrimination in Respect of Employment

and Occupation

-International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights

-International Covenant on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights

-International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial

Discrimination

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HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

APPENDIX III

PRESS RELEASES

European Parliament Hearing Focuses on the

Current Threats and Policies For a Turkmen Future in Iraq

15h30 – 16h30

5 December 2011

Room ASP 1G2, European Parliament, Brussels

Brussels, 1 December 2011

At the initiative of

Mr Metin Kazak MEP,

Vice-Chair of the Subcommittee on Human Rights, the European

Parliament will convene the first hearing to examine the human rights situation of Turkmen communities in

Iraq when the

European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights

meets on

5 December 2011 at 15h30.

The hearing comes amid the withdrawal of American combat forces from Iraq, continued debate over the

long-delayed implementation of Article 140 of Iraq’s Constitution, and the ongoing targeted assassination,

discrimination and marginalization of Turkmen in Kerkuk and throughout Iraq.

Caught in the midst of disputes between Iraq’s communities, the Turkmen of Kerkuk live atop the vast oil

wealth of Kerkuk that makes resolution of the disputed territory politically contentious but also key to the

economic development of Iraq as a whole. Overlooked but caught up in the instability and insecurity of Kerkuk

and other Turkmen areas are questions of reparations for dispossessed Turkmen, kidnapping of civilians and

minors for ransom – all of which has contributed to a debilitating brain-drain of Turkmen from Iraq that is

undermining the country’s recovery and historic cultural heterogeneity.

Mr Kazak noted his belief that

“a constructive discussion is urgently needed, both to deepen understanding

and to raise the level of debate so that new policies and new thinking can meet the challenges facing Iraqi

Turkmen.”

The hearing will complement the EU’s growing interest and capacity in Iraq, something Mr

Busdachin, General Secretary of the UNPO, believed

“builds upon a cross-party interest – our past

conferences on Kerkuk, Article 140, and the situation of Iraq’s communities have proved this, and for the

Subcommittee to take this further is incredibly valuable at this time.”

The hearing will include perspectives from

Professor Stefan Wolff

(University of Birmingham),

Mr Hasan

Özmen

(Member of the Iraqi Council of Representatives),

Professor Ibrahim Sirkeci

(Regent’s College), and the

European External Action Service,

before closing remarks by

Ms Barbara Lochbihler,

Chair of the

Subcommittee on Human Rights. The hearing is organised by the

Office of Mr Metin Kazak MEP

and the

Secretariat of the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights,

with the collaboration of the

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization

and supported by

Iraqi Turkmen organizations

from the

European Union and Iraq.

This press release is issued by the Office of Metin Kazak MEP

and the

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization

_________________________________________________________________________________

For more information on the situation facing the Iraqi Turkmen, please contact the

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization

Avenue Louise 52 | Brussels | B-1050 | Belgium

Telephone: +32 (0) 251 31459 | Fax: +32 (0) 251 31495 | Email:

[email protected]

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يروفلا رشنلل

يفحص نايب

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ىلع زكرت يبورولأا ناملربلا ةسلج

قارعلا يف نامكرتلا لبقتسم لجأ نم ةيلاحلا تاسايسلاو تاديدهتلا

16:50 -15:50

ةسلجلا دقع تقو

2011

لولأا نوناك

لسكورب ،يبرولأا ناملربلا ،

ASP 1G2

ةعاقلا

2011

لولأا نوناك

، لسكورب

،ناسنلإا قوقحل ةيعرفلا ةنجللا سيئر بئان ،

MEP

يبرولأا ناملربلا وضع

Metin Kazak

كازاك نيتم ديسلا

ةردابم ىلع ءانب

ةنجللا

عامتجإ للاخ كلذو قارعلا يف ةينامكرتلا تانوكملل ةبسنلاب ناسنلإا قوقح ةلاح يف رظنلل هل ةسلج لوأ يبورولأا ناملربلا دقعيس

باحسنا ناّبإ دقعنت يتلا ،ةسلجلا نإ

1011

لولأا نوناك

موي نم

13:50

ةعاسلا يف يبرولأا ناملربلا يف ناسنلإا قوقحل ةيعرفلا

زييمتلاو لايتغلااو ،اهراظتنا لاط يتلا يقارعلا روتسدلا نم

140

ةداملا ذيفنت ةشقانم لصاوتس ،قارعلا نم ةلتاقملا ةيكيرملاا تاوقلا

قارعلا مومع يفو كوكرك يف نامكرتلا دض هّجوملاو يراجلا شيمهتلاو

كانه لعجي امم اذهو كوكرك يف ةلئاه ةيطفن ةورث قوف نوشيعي كوكرك نامكرت ناب ىرن ،ةيقارعلا تانوكملا نيب تاعازنلا مّضخ يف

يف ةيداصتقلاا ةيمنتلا يف اايساسأ ا ارصنع اضيأ ةورثلا هذه ربَ تعت نكلو اهيلع عزانتملا يضارلأا نأشب رارقلا لوح ا ارمتسم اايسايس اً دج

لا

تاضيوعت لئاسم كردتسن ىرخلأا ةينامكرتلا قطانملاو كوكرك يف نملأا مادعناو رارقتسلاا مدع نع يضاغتلابو

لكك قارعلا

يوذ نامكرتلا ةرجه يف اهعيمج تمهاس يتلاو

ةيدف ىلع لوصحلا لجأ نم نيرصاقلاو نييندملا فاطتخاو ،نيمورحملا نامكرتلا

يخيراتلا يفاقثلا سناجتلا مدعو دلابلا شاعتنا ضيوقت ىلإ تدأ يتلاو قارعلا نم ةكهنُملا لوقعلا

شاقنلا ىوتسم عفرو مهافتلا قيمعت لجأ نم ،ءانب شاقن ءارجلإ ةحلم ةجاح كانه

هنأب هداقتعا ىلإ

Kazak

كازاك ديسلا راشأ دقل

داحتلاا ةحلصمل ةلِمكم ةسلجلا نوكتس

قارعلا يف نامكرتلا هجاوت يتلا تايدحتلا ةهجاوم ةديدجلا راكفلأاو تاسايسلل نكمي ثيحب

ةلثَ مُملا ريغ بوعشلاو لودلا ةمظنمل ماعلا نيملأا ،

Busdachin

نخادسوب ديسلا نإ ، قارعلا يف نيتيمانتملا هتردقو يبورولأا

تانوكملا ةلاحو ،

140

ةداملاو ،كوكرك نأشب ةقباسلا انتارمتؤم نإف

–

ةلدابتملا فارطلأا ةحلصم ىلع اءانب

هنأب دقتعي ،

UNPO

ُق يضملاب ةيعرفلا ةنجللا مايق نإو ، رملأا اذه تتبثأ دق قارعلا يف

ريغ لكشبو اميق ارمأ تقولا اذه يف نوكيس رملأا اذه يف امد

ًّ ً

ً ُ

" .

لوقعم

نسح ديسلاو

(

ماهجنمرب ةعماج

)

Professor Stefan Wolff

فلو نافيتس روسفوربلا

نم لك رظن تاهجو ةسلجلا نمضتتس

لمعلا ةئيهو

(

تنجير ةيلك

)

Professor Ibrahim Sirkeci

يجكريس ميهاربإ ديسلاو ،

(

يقارعلا باونلا سلجم وضع

)

نامثع

ةيعرفلا ةنجللا ةسيئر ،

Ms Barbara Lochbihler

رلهيبخول اربراب ةديسلا

لبق نم تاحيرصتلا متَ تخت نأ لبق ،

يبورولأا يجراخلا

ةماعلا ةناملأا

MEP

يبرولأا ناملربلا وضع

Metin Kazak

كازاك نيتم ديسلا بتكم

لبق نم ةسلجلا ميظنت متيس

ناسنلإا قوقحل

َ ُ

تامظنملا

نم معدبو

UNPO

ةلثمملا ريغ بوعشلاو لودلا ةمظنم

عم نواعتلاب ،

يبورولأا ناملربلا يف ناسنلإا قوقحل ةيعرفلا ةنجلل

قارعلاو يبورولاا داحتلاا يف

ةيقارعلا ةينامكرتلا

MEP

يبرولأا ناملربلا وضع

Metin Kazak

كازاك نيتم ديسلا بتكم نم يفحصلا نايبلا اذه ردص

كلذكو

َ ُ

UNPO

ةلثمملا ريغ بوعشلاو لودلا ةمظنم

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

لاصتلاا ىجري ،قارعلا يف نامكرتلا هجاوت يتلا فورظلا لوح تامولعملا نم ديزملا لجأ نم

َ ُ

UNPO

ةلثمملا ريغ بوعشلاو لودلا ةمظنمب

Avenue Louise 52 | Brussels | B-1050 | Belgium

Telephone: +32 (0) 251 31459 | Fax: +32 (0) 251 31495 | Email: [email protected]

URU, Alm.del - 2014-15 (1. samling) - Bilag 103: Henvendelse af 2. februar 2015 fra Dansk Turkmensk Venskabsforening om situationen for turkmenere i Irak

45 |

PUBLIC HEARING:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION OF TURKMEN OF IRAQ

First European Parliament Hearing on Human Rights of

Iraqi Turkmen Ends with Call for Greater EU Engagement

Brussels, 5 December 2011

The situation in Iraq and Kerkuk, where most Turkmen live, is at a critical juncture as the United States

concludes its withdrawal from Iraq on 31 December 2011 with many measures to safeguard continued security

and stability still to be found. At the prompting of

Mr Metin Kazak MEP,

the hearing was convened so that

deputies of the European Parliament could hear of the dire human situation facing one of Iraq’s oldest

communities, as Mr Kazak expressed, “of all the communities in Iraq, I believe Turkmen have been amongst

the most overlooked.”

Echoing these concerns, ,

Barbara Lochbihler MEP,

Chair of the Subcommittee on Human Rights, believed the

Turkmen situation to be “precarious” and subsequent questions from both

Struan Stevenson MEP

and

Frieda

Brepoels MEP

demonstrated the fears for future security in Iraq, need for deepening European commitment

to Iraq and the desire to understand better the maturing constitutional situation in Iraq. This came after

interventions from academics, Turkmen representatives and the

European External Action Service

all

respectively demonstrating the opportunity, need, and commitment of the European Union to support

positive and lasting change to Iraq’s communities.

Stressing to deputies that “Yezidis, Shabak, Turkmen all need support…[and] ask for you to become involved”

in normalizing the situation The Turkmen community

Mr Husan Özmen,

member of the Iraqi Council of

Representatives said his community “want a multicultural society…[and] stress the importance of dialogue.”

Outlining abuses perpetrated against the Turkmen community, Mr Özmen believed the solution lay in

establishing a structure in Kerkuk that could, over ten years, bring Arabs, Kurds, and Turkmen together to work

together with the aim of forming a special federal region for Kerkuk.

Bringing contextual knowledge from his studies of similar post-conflict areas,

Professor Stefan Wolff

of the

University of Birmingham spoke of Iraq’s obligations to protect civil and political rights noting that the

“suffering [of Turkmen] has been recognized by the Iraqi constitution” but there remained a gap between

constitutional provisions and the implementation of these into law and policy. With the impact that migration

was having on the Turkmen community,

Professor Ibrahim Sirkeci

noted that assimilation policies and conflict

had both enervated the Turkmen community, but their claims remained strong although there was a need for

new research into the contemporary situation.

Marino Busdachin,

General Secretary of the UNPO and facilitator of the conference with the Office of Mr

Metin Kazak and the Subcommittee on Human Rights remarked at the close of the hearing that “an important

new phase has opened in Iraq and for the Turkmen this hearing has sent important signals, now our hope is for

matching commitments”

This press release is issued by the Office of Metin Kazak MEP

and the

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization

_________________________________________________________________________________

For more information on the situation facing the Iraqi Turkmen, please contact the

Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization

Avenue Louise 52 | Brussels | B-1050 | Belgium

Telephone: +32 (0) 251 31459 | Fax: +32 (0) 251 31495 | Email:

[email protected]