 Iraqi Kurds will have no choice but to proclaim independence in the event of civil war in Iraq, Massud Barzani, president of northern Iraqâs semi-autonomous Kurdish zone, said Friday.
In an interview with Turkish television station NTV on a day of fresh bombings of Shiite mosques in Iraq, Barzani said an outbreak of civil war would force Iraqi Kurds to exercise the ârightâ to independence. âMay God save us from civil war, but if others start fighting among themselves and there is an outbreak, we will have no other alternative,â he said.
| "We don't have time for that juvenile crap." |
He said that while independence was a ânatural and legitimate rightâ for Iraqi Kurds, they would âat this stageâ implement the countryâs new constitution in support of a âdemocratic federal and pluralistâ Iraq. Turkey fears a declaration of independence by Iraqâs Kurds would inflame a rebellion by separatists within its own large Kurdish minority. Barzani downplayed the presence of anti-Turkey Kurdish rebels in his territory of northern Iraq, saying there was no military solution to the unrest in Turkey.
| Call this a shot across the bow, both to Congress and to the Iraqi gummint. And I'm all for it. |
| We'll just have to make sure we keep the Turks off their backs. |
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