Kurdish Oil Deal Shocks Iraq's Political Leaders

[donsu]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-oildeal1dec01,0,4057840.story?coll=la-home-headlines


A controversial oil exploration deal between Iraq's autonomy-minded Kurds and a Norwegian company got underway this week without the approval of the central government here, raising a potentially explosive issue at a time of heightened ethnic and sectarian tensions.

The Kurdistan Democratic Party, which controls a portion of the semiautonomous Kurdish enclave in northern Iraq, last year quietly signed a deal with Norway's DNO to drill for oil near the border city of Zakho. Iraqi and company officials describe the agreement as the first involving new exploration in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

Drilling began after a ceremony Tuesday, during which Nechirvan Barzani, prime minister of the Kurdish northern region, vowed "there is no way Kurdistan would accept that the central government will control our resources," according to news agency reports.

In Baghdad, political leaders on Wednesday reacted to the deal with astonishment.
-snip-
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and there is this:

Iraq's neighbors also fear the possibility of Iraqi Kurds using revenue generated by oil wells to fund an independent state that might lead the roughly 20 million Kurds living in Turkey, Iran and Syria to revolt.
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I don't know, sometimes I think the people of the world will be better off after the oil runs dry. but it's a toss up: which will come sooner, no oil or the galloping global warming catastrophe. (after having to deal with 5 hurricanes this summer I look toward next summer with dread. that's a first for me)

[ewagner]

1. When the Shiia

take control of the rest of the country and consolidate their control over the militia, then they will attack the Kurds and the bloodiest of Civil wars will break out...

oh yeah, and one more thing....

don't think the Turks are going to like this one little bit.

[BJW]

2. Well, Norway did contribute 10 "troops" to the coaliation

maybe they've been working on the oil deal all along. I also wonder who owns the "Norwegian" company.

[enigma000]

4. darn Vikings

So all along I thought it was PNAC......turns out this whole war & occupation was for the benefit of those Scandinavian Vikings.

Never saw it coming.

[enigma000]

3. The Kurds want to get on with life and leave

this shipwreck called Iraq.

The Shiites haven't shown any hostility towards the Kurds. And the Turks might as well except the inevitable. What can they do? Turkey has to be on good behavior in order to have accession talks with the EU. As well, they won't defy the United States should an independent Kurdistan receive American support.

[Xithras]

12. If the world were a just place, they'd be allowed to separate.

Kurdistan has never really been a part of Iraq, except on paper. You have 40 million people in an area as big as France, who have been a distinct cultural and ethnic group for a couple thousand years, and who were promised their own nation when the Ottoman Empire was broken up at the end of WWI (Kurdistan existed as an Ottoman province prior to that). Kurdistan isn't a separate nation today simply because of greed...Ataturks greed for land, and the British greed for oil. Those interests conspired to keep the Kurds from having their own country, and split their land between four nations.

[enigma000]

14. More than greed

Sometimes, these things happen. Not everyone can be pleaded. I'm thinking you read the book 1919: the year that changed the world

[WCGreen]

5. When the Kurds get in the way....

The SHi'ite will hit the fan...

[Wetzelbill]

7. aren't you a Lounge Lizard?

what are you doing playing around in here. Go back to the children's table. :)


Yes, the Shiite will hit the fan. :) The outlook is not Sunni.

[sendero]

15. That would be..

... in the whey :)

[donsu]

6. the bushgang has to be connected with this Norwegian oil corp.

or they have their pockets in some part of the deal. the bushgang wouldn't let any oil found leave Iraq without first passing through their hands.

[BJW]

9. I suspect the same thing!

[TexasLawyer]

8. Recommended

This is an important story.

[Wetzelbill]

10. what's interesting is the Kurdish group that did this

is the one that has always been poorer than the other group. Iraqi President Jalal Talabani was the head of PUK, while Massoud Barzani was the head of the KDP. PUK controls most of the oil in Kurdistan. Nechirvan Barzani could be trying to get an economic equalizer to compete against the influence of Talabani and his PUK organization. That he went around a Kurdish president who is the mortal enemy of his Uncle Massoud to do so is interesting. This could get wild.

[Disturbed]

11. DNO

http://www.subsea.org/company/listdetails.asp?companyid=215

[cantstandbush]

13. And we wonder why the insurgency has stepped up? They know

what's going down. We favor the Kurds (terrorists in their own right) over Shia and Sunnis.

[Miss Chybil]

16. Kurds are terrorists? Did I miss something? nt

[cantstandbush]

17. yes, Google to find out who the Kurds are and their history of violence.

Kurds killed a huge number of themselves during their in-fighting.

[Doctor_J]

18. Hmm. Looks like this month's "elections" might not be

the giant milestone that all of the Bushwhores are trying to make it into. Civil War's a-bustin' out all over.

[Doctor_J]

19. Maybe Iraq's "Political Leaders" are like * -

getting only the news they want to hear, from flunkies.

[Wordie]

20. It gets worse...

Barghouti has said that the Iraqi Kurds will revolt and go for independence if there is civil war in Iraq, which at this point appears to be getting much closer on a daily basis. As much as I have sympathy for cultures who wish to have self-determination, if they left Iraq to form their own country, it would have implications that would extend to all the five neighboring countries that have large Kurdish populations, who also would want independence.

There have even been contracts entered into for the construction of an airport in the Kurdish area, which is said to be the "next step" toward Kurdish independence.

Read more about it here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x5513397

This looks in many ways to be inevitable, and will throw the entire region into a horrible conflict, which is not exactly great for US interests.

[Disturbed]

21. The Bush Regime has unleashed the dogs of war.

Iraq will split into three waring territories.