Dr Can Erimtan
21st Century Wire
Turkey’s Tayyip Erdoğan (aka the Prez) is now once again performing a delicate war-dance with his partners Russia and America, with President Putin (aka the Czar) clearly supporting his southern neighbour while the U.S. President Trump appears as clueless as ever.
The Kurds find themselves caught in the middle of a power struggle between the U.S., Russia, Turkey, Iran and Syria — a familiar situation that follows decades of geopolitical strife in their region, explains Ted Snider. By Ted Snider The only thing…Read more →
By M K Bhadrakumar | Indian Punchline | January 9, 2018 The Russian airbase in Syria, Hmeimim, and the naval base at Tartus came under simultaneous drone attack on Saturday. The advanced Russian air defence system thwarted the attack. A wave of 13 drones was involved, and, interestingly, three of them were brought down intact. […]
The silence from Iraqi Kurdistan this week over the American president’s decision to relocate the US embassy to the divided city of Jerusalem was deafening.
The diplomatic hush was only amplified as, one by one, all of the neighbors of northern Iraq’s Kurdistan regional government vociferously condemned the move.
It’s a silence that could come back to haunt Iraqi Kurdish decision makers in the longer term.
Regional opposition to President Donald Trump’s decision was not entirely on religious grounds.
Rouhani, Putin and Erdogan say the end of the war in Syria is at hand [PPIO]
The Presidents of Iran, Russia and Turkey have concluded a tripartite summit on Syria in Sochi and say there is a real chance for peace now that the Islamic State has been largely defeated.
With IS forces routed in Syria (and Iraq), a cessation of hostilities in full effect, and hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees returning home, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that there is a real chance a political settlement will end the seven-year civil war.
Source : Lawrence Davidson, Consortium News, 17-10-2017
Il y a presque un siècle, les puissances européennes promettaient aux Kurdes un état, mais sont vite revenues sur leur promesse, laissant les nationalistes Kurdes enrager pour des générations, et conduisant l’Irak à la capture militaire récente de Kirkuk, comme le rapporte Lawrence Davidson.
On the 25th of September, Iraqi Kurds held a secessionist vote based on the principles of extreme ethno-nationalist, where Kurds voted to separate from Iraq. The referendum was boycotted by Arabs, Assyrians, Armenians and local Turkmen and was doubly controversial as it included areas of Iraq that had been unilaterally occupied by Kurdish militants, which are outside the legally defined Kurdish Autonomous Region in northern Iraq.
BFFs: Kurdish Regional Government President Massoud Barzani making plans with Israeli leader Bibi Netanyahu.
Dr Can Erimtan
21st Century Wire
Identity Politics and the Spectre of Micro-Nations
Iraqi Prime Minister Haydar al-Abadi was in Tehran on Thursday for consultations with the Iranian government (no, Abadi isn’t afraid of Trump.). During his meeting with Iranian vice president Ishaq Jahangiri, his office released a statement replying to Massoud Barzani.
Barzani is the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, an autonomous super-province of Iraq that recently tried to secede. After losing Kirkuk to the Iraqi army last week, Barzani issued a statement that he was suspending the results of the referendum on independence.
A political miscalculation by Iraqi Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani – staging an independence referendum that prompted fierce retaliation by Baghdad – has set back hopes for a Kurdish state by decades, writes Joe Lauria. By Joe Lauria Masoud Barzani was…Read more →
