Kurdistan Bloggers Union

Excuse the lame title, I'm pretty sleepy and its late


It's so difficult a find a news article or a supposed political analyst mention exactly what led to the chaos we are facing now in Iraq. You know at least mention why things were relatively quiet after the fall of saddam and only exploded later.
All I seem to get is either that the US did everything right and its all the iraqis fault or stories that roughly say the US are money-grabbers who probably provide sexual favors to the devil for some cash. Very very few articles that provide a balanced view, just journalist using dying human beings as pawns in their little glorified "ha got you there" fight.

So instead of waiting for some article to show up i thought why not list things i thought went wrong after the war. It would be great to know what others (especially if other iraqis are reading this) think about it. Though just in case there are others who are wanting to do some name-calling and ass-roasting please keep it to a minimum as it won't do u any good. Intelligeble criticism on the other hand would be great.


1. Reluctance to give work to iraqis

This had to be the biggest mistake done. I mean why not let workaholics work. I mean these are ppl would go to work (and very hard) in the worst conditions such as sanctions, war ,when salaries were around 3-4 dollars a month and now when the threat of dying is everywhere. And in the aftermath of the war iraq was filled with overqualified and unemployed ppl who would be more than happy to rebuild their country.

This wasn't the bad part it would have been sort of understandable if hi-tech jobs were out of iraqis reach but even the most menial of jobs were given to non-iraqis hired from abroad (its almost like taking a page out of saddams book).
For example truck drivers from abroad... what so difficult about truck driving that its not given to the "simple-minded" iraqi… well at least if they were iraqi they could have been sued or jailed for selling 100s of thousands of dollars of equipments across the border (a matter that has happened alot). Also even cooks, cleaners and manual laborers was brought from abroad. You know how many poor families could have been helped by that. This would have also kept the young poverty-stricken age group away from these extremist groups. The young and unemployed are the meat these terrorist groups feed on.


2. Reconstruction

See when we were watching the damage during the war we would joke (in our own dark special way) about how at least there will be plenty of jobs later. Mind you, in some of saddam's detested cities such as the shia regions there are damages since the first gulf war and even the iran-iraq war that haven't been attended to.

Let me clarify there are really good projects going on ( see for ureself ) and some really determined and great iraqis and foreigners who were keen on providing the best for iraq.
Unfortunately corrupt individuals and businesses (and this from many many nationalities including iraqis sadly) were involved and by some sick reason decided to take advantage of the chaos to fill their pockets while focus was elsewhere. This was done by either setting up "dummy" companies, skimming from the budget, promising (expensive) products but failing to deliver etc...
Due to this, most of the reconstruction was halted and each project had to undergo a slow validation process.
Also security has worsened so most companies are not sure how to move on with projects if their equipments are looted within hours of installing them

I have some idea about the reconstruction bit but I think someone who has worked in iraq (like mustang for example) would be a better source for information regarding that

The sad part is that this would have been a great opportunity to win the hearts and minds they keep talking about. I mean if people could see that there were improvements in the country. These conspiracy theories would slow down

3. Sidelining iraqis when it came to security

What didn't make it to the news was that iraqis were coming forward to US and coalition authorities to give info on suspicious characters, especially when they thought they were secure. For example of iraqis knew the triangle of death was the HQ for ex-baath officials even ppl from their cities were coming forward. They weren't taken seriously.

Also the mehdi militia have been harassing people since last summer, either looting travelers who crossed their paths or christian families for not acting muslims (whatever that means) while troops there were turning a blind eye . This caused a lot of resentment and lack of trust. Why do u think it was all silent an fairly peaceful the first month, these people were hiding because they expecting some form of punishment of jail-time. Unfortunately nothing came and that encouraged them to reach the point they are at now.

4. De-baathification and subsequent baathification of jobs

Actually this is a point my grandmother mentioned alot. Just to clarify she's lived through 4 regime changes so she knows what she's talking about.

What used to happen during the previous regime changes, the structures of various ministries and organizations would remain the same, a curfew would be imposed and the leaders of these orgaisation would be caught (and then executed) while the lower ranks remain the same and continue their job. Through time, the members of the ministries who were thought to have strong links to the previous government would be weeded out and probably faced the same treatment their leaders did.
I know it sounds harsh but we're dealing with the Baath here. Maybe a pardon law could be implement for those who don’t have blood on their hands).

Now what happened instead was that these organizations were disbanded. Given enough time to regroup privately under different names and then a year later put back into circulation. How else do you explain the way all these criminal gangs knowing exactly where iraqis IP and ING are.

5. The wanted list only contained 55 people.

Unfortunately it wasn't only 55 ppl who were controlling iraq. There were also the secret police (mukhabarat), army, saddams and baath members family. Why were these ppl let go. Saddams family were allowed to leave stealing most of iraqs money, no questions asked. The other 55 members the same thing. All have registered their properties and accounts under the names of family members, and no surprise if that is one of the many sources funding the insurgency.
As for the secret police is it any wonder that these crimes are committed, filmed and documented exactly the same way the mkhabarat used to work. And its no wonder its taking place in the triangle of death were most of the mukhabarat officials came from. Take falloujah , 30% of that city's population were part of the mukhabarat . I'm not exactly trying to loop these cities i mean there are good people there as well but these cities were generally saddams preferred groups


6. Regional countries interferences in Iraq's future.

This was even during the war, i never got to see an iraqi speak about what it meant to him all we got were ppl from every country in the world speaking for Iraqis.
Also after the war why were all the deals done with government that saddam worked with. I mean why were the iraqi schoolbooks given to jordan to publish (for millions pf dollars) when there are printing presses in Iraq. To make it worse it’s been 2 school years and students still don’t have new books
Why was our telecom (ok baghdads anyway) given to egypt (no offence but its extremely faulty... as ridiculous as getting camels from alaska) Anyway if the kurds could establish mobile phone companies the iraqis can definitely do the same if given the right resources.
Also how come every single office/company that closes in Iraq ends up in jordan (UN, Red Cross, etc) and why do all iraq-related conferences take place there, haven’t they made enough money out of us aready. Why not keep it in Kurdistan (which is relatively dafe) at least the money the money would go back into iraqs economy.

Or how about security, when iraqs police and army was disbanded turkey demanded the US to take the peshmerga out of mosul and kirkuk, which they did. Now who was left to protect those cities from the insurgency

7. Borders
This has been mentioned alot. Of course this leads me to what i thought was a crazy theory but seems to becoming more and more true by the day. But I leave that for another time

8. Kirkuk
aah kirkuk, look now i don't care if the city is called arabic, turkmen, Christian or kurdish just let the ppl go back home. It is not fair that there are people living like refugees in their own country. The past 2 years no one has asked why a city that was once over 21,000 sq km (i'll check the exact number and add it here) was reduced to 9,000 sq km during saddams time. No one gives a damn why there are refugees living outside their car and in dingy refugee tents, i mean there are organizations that support non-iraqi arab refugees in iraq but nothing for iraqis.
Now these people aren't allowed to return but foreign fighters have filled the city, and no one seems bothered by that. And if it is true zarqawi is hiding there then watch out this will be much more bloody than falloujah.

So, in Iran, they whipped them until death, and in Turkey, they riddle them with bullets.

In the village of Qoser, in the region of Mardin, Ahmet Kaymaz (31) and his son Uxur Kaymaz (12 ) have been killed by Turkish forces.

Ahmet Kaymaz's brother, Reshat Kaymaz related the fact :

“My brother was a driver, he brought his children in that way. So that is happened : An evening, my brother and his son Uxur went outside, they wanted to drive the truck. When suddenly, they were targetted by a sustained fire from police and army. My nephew received 13 bullets and my brother 7.”

Reshat Kaymaz continues : “They are martyrs, everybody could see how a father and his child were riddled with bullets… It is a crime and I call all the world to break the silence and to stop the savagery of Turkish police and soldiers ...”

Source Avesta

Sure that they must work a bit to fill the Copenhague criterions...

In any case, it seems that Turkish army has just stated that terrorists have been killed during an operation.

Or Günese yolculuk, of Yesim Ustaoglu. I know, the movie came out in 1999, but watching movies in late is my speciality.

whatever Iraq(the word) means, just listen to what its people feel like against each other,
this extract was shocking for me:
(Not to be outdone, a Kurdish commando told me he does not like any of his Arab countrymen. "I've got a picture of Ariel Sharon at my house," the man said, "I want to send my children away to live in Israel.")
interesting, read it!

So as Hiwa and Kardox has already mentionned, in the Kurdish city of Sanadaj, a fourteen years old boy had been condemned to 85 whips for having eating during Ramadan..

But as mollahs' God is very Merciful and Compassionate, as everybody knows, the boy died at the fifteenth.

Allahu Akbar !

It's depressing how little attention Mrs. Hassan's fate has received, i mean apart from iraqi outlets the world seems to be completely mute to it. I mean even when there is news stating that the limbless decapitated and disembowled corpse found in fallujah is probalby hers… nothing. On the same day news came out about an insurgent being shot while hiding in a mosque and what do we get FURY, OUTRAGE, CONDEMNATION, UPROAR. This would have been ok if they were speaking out of a pure heart, but its obvious that this is just going to be the beggining of another ugly media sensationalism like abu ghuraib was. Correct me if I'm wrong but I defintely don't remember any aid package or any form of support sent to the people involved by those that raised hell over it.

That was a genuine case of opportunism, it started off as an act that received worldwide revulsion but was then cheapened into this tool that was used to kidnap and kill more iraqis, or for opposing political groups to score points off each other, or as a substitue in the middle east to the generic zionist conspiracy template used the excuswe all their acts. Don't believe me, i even heard some sudanese official using abu ghraib is his defense against a question regarding darfur.

It was beyond ridiculous watching these other arabs screaming like they really cared, because a fact most people don't know was that the abu ghraib prison abuse was first mentioned by an Iraqi in a press conference in an arabic country at the beginning of january. At the time it got a few small mentions in newspapers, if they cared so much about it then why did they wait 4 months later till an american news channel mention to go on an um.. anti-american tirade.

Anyway getting back on topic, at least those dead fallujans get an investigation. I wonder how many other dead iraqis get the same right. Whether they were killed though the kidnapping method (hell who am i kidding they don’t even have a body count for them) or though crossfire or through the many cowardice acts of murder whether in kerbala, the UN iraq office, hawler or actually any damn street where this type of vermin has contaminated. And yet while other iraqis are sacrificing their lives to help iraq and trying to move on with their lives. These people have been doing all they can to destroy iraq and then complain about the aftermath

These whinging bunch are a funny group aren't they:

They kill aid workers (unfortunately she wasn't the first to be killed in the past year)and complain why they don't receive any aid

They force medical teams out of Iraq and then complain why they don't receive adequate treatment

They kill anyone (iraqi or non-iraqi) who attempts to help Iraq and then complain why no ones doing anything for the country

They support all acts of crimes done by the satirically named resistance and complain why there's no security

They never as much as give an animal right to their victims while they scream and dance to the tune of human rights when it comes to one of their own

They threaten to kill all electoral candidates and voters then bawl about why there's no legitimate government

They threaten and go as far as kill anyone who dares speak against them or even the previous regime yet are allowed to lie, deceive and incite violence under the banner of free speech


They threaten and brutally murder all other groups in Iraq and then complain that they are victimized WHY?? Because no matter what they are ALWAYS the victims


And after all this they still feel like they haven't done enough, tell me what's left that you guys haven't done, if you wanna live like animals, fine in fact I'm pretty sure there would be many volunteers who can find the right petting zoo to keep you in but don't expect to force everyone else to live as you do.

Now I am too busy to even follow up the posts here but I dont think this news will make it to any where simply because Iranians can hide stuff very well and because he was a Kurd!

I was reading in www.peyamner.com that a 14 year old Kurdish boy in the city of Sanandaj (Sna) or as Iranians call it city of Kurdistan Province, because of allegations of not fasting Ramadan, he was sentsenced by the so called Judge with 85 (!!!!!) lashes! the poor boy died before he grows up and learns that his nation is always accused of stuff like that and always been lashed to death, he even didnt live long enough to learn abou other massacres nor his news made it to anywhere!


Human Rights? ---- shame on humanity
Ramadan ---- shame on the Isamists
me ---- I dint fast a signle day of it, and this made me feel so happy that I didnt, and this is the first time i feel happy not fasting Ramadan.

The rest of the news is so important but not as much as a single lash which he had!
i got so much to say that i will just shut up like he did!

unoffically, this is just one of many everyday tradegies.

Corpses of 11 Kurdish villagers detained by Turkish Military found in mass grave

My heart goes out to the former villages of Kulp. In fact I know an entire family whose lives were destroyed when their village (Kulp) was taken, so this news article kind of hit home, and part of me wasn't sure what to say about it for a while.

Mass graves are nothing new, but publically pushing it into the offending state's face, how divinely brilliant.

From an archeaologist point of view, a gravesite is a blessing and a curse. A blessing because it normally is a jackpot in funding possibilites, a curse because it means stopping production and everyone is on their knees digging with dental picks for 2 weeks. Our first site dug in Diyarbakir was of a destroyed village named, to us anyway, as Boztepe. We set up trenches in the rubble of mudbrick houses that in 1993 were torn down by the Turkish jandarma. We were watched very closely because they didn't want us to find anything recent that could incriminate them somehow. If we spoke out about the Kurdish situation our permit would be revoked immediately, so things were very verry tense that field season. We found a gravesite, but it was 4000 years old. Our next site, Kenan Tepe, was located next to the village of Kenan Koy, which will be flooded because of the dams, but we couldn't tell them that or our permit would have been revoked. We have heard of stories of other sites finding mass burials that might have been Armenian, and the Turkish army would sweep down and confiscate all the artifacts. It is odd to think of archaeology as having political implications, but it does, and a lot of things are silenced in the name of keeping permits and funding. So it leaves the local people where the atrocities are visited upon to be the vocal about it. So today I am very proud of the people of Kulp, a fine community of Kurds who are adement in seeking justice.

Couldn't think of a kurdish or english title that could fit this situation pretty well, but this arabic one (referring to gross injustice) seems to work. To those interested this is a reference from the Quran regarding how pre-islamic arabs used to bury newly born daughters alive, have they really changed since then, i'll leave that to you.

I was really hoping that this could be wrong or the video faked or any number of conspiracy theories, but unfortunately it seems to be true. May she rest in peace and condolences to her family. It was pretty heartwenching to watch her husband asking for her body back just so he could bury her, but I must say what a calm and quiet man.
How can a woman who spent the last 30 years of her life as a teacher and a relief worker despite going through 3 wars and sanctions.

Where's the outrage, the anger to all this injustice, the demonstrations.. why isn't there anything?. Do people have no feelings anymore? I don't know what else it would take to get the braindead sheep of the world to realise what these supposed "resistance" fighters really stand for. Anyone who attempts getting Iraq out of the stoneage has a death threat hanging on their head. Take for example the news today of kidnapping (and let's face it the eventual killing) of 31 more police officers on their way back from *surprise* jordan, maybe they should call it the path of death.

But getting back on topic, LadyBug, one of her students, has this post about her and to those who can read arabic, here's a really heartfelt message in Elaph entitled When Margaret Hassan was an Iraqi Mother. It was written from one of her students in the 80s, Dr. Mohd Rasool Mohd, when she used to teach in the british council. This was first published before news of her execution came out but elaph published it again today.

I won't translate it all, but here are the main points:

"In september of 1980 I met Margaret Hassan for the first time in the Waziriya distrct in Baghdad, and more specifically in the British Council there, where she was working as the the first secretary to the institute, you couldn't enter the informations centre without meeting this woman who would greet you with the glee of a mother and sister at the same time..."

"Margaret Hassan, the british woman married to an Iraqi, was a spring of love and affection, a humanitarian who knew no limits. Everyone she's ever taught remembers her, and anyone who knew her knows how much she loved the Iraqi people. How many iraqis of limited means have turned to her when they couldn't afford the books, the papers and other resources they needed, and how many iraqis, who knew how useful the english language was to their future, would turn to her when they couldn't afford the fees for the institute. There are many many other examples of this woman's humanity"

"After the hero of arabic freedom attacked kuweit, the british council locked its doors (after iraqi-uk ties were cut off) but she still stayed on "

"Mrs Margret, along with her family, could have left Iraq tpo Ireland or the UK or anywhere in the world due to her irish nationality but she decided to stay in Iraq"

"the will of evil dominates the acts and behaviour of the new criminals in Iraq, they won't even consider what it means to kidnap a women who is a an iraqi before being a foreigner and what are their spokespeople in kidnapping going to tell the world when they are burning all the values of human love and communion. Mrs margaret embodied these values when she married an Iraqi Muslim, lived in his society and tasted the bitterness that Iraq lived through in these past decades."

Now you can type www.Kurdistani.tk to access this blog.

ok 2 totally unrealted topics but there u go.
Emmanuah, a regular commentor here on kbu has created a blog dedicated to peshmerga women whom she's a huge fan of, it's a pretty nice idea and best of luck since information about these women is very rare.

Now eid, so far the first day of eid was either yesterday, today and for some sects tomorrow, ah yes islamic unity is so strong that we don't even trust each other on moonsightings. But there you go, so Jezentan Peroz bet and Eid Mubarak everyone.

The regular formalities of Eid usually involve the phonecalls and the visits.
The phonecalls take quite a while so they're spread between 2-3 days (think of it as a world tour .. just by phone), basically trying to contact the various parts of Iraq alone take up enough time,its not the talking that takes too long its finding a working line. Some areas have landlines other don't, some mobiles work other don't and lines are usually busy for no apparent reason. This is slightly easier than how it used to be before, my mother used to make us take turns doing the redials (each of us had a 10 minute try). By the end we almost feel like we've established a bond with the machine of a women saying "khat al jihatil Matlooba mashghool" (the line you requested is busy). That woman could have joined our family and we wouldn't have found anything strange about it.
The funt thing is these phonecalls always have to end with inshallah next jezehn (eid) we'll be in kurdistan/iraq (depending who we're speaking with). But this has been going on for such a long time that its almost like a recurring joke that you have to mention, cos its always next eid, next birthday, next child, next irritable bowel syndrome, next new year..that way. Anyway on this side its become like a sarcastic remark ever since we reach double digits.

As for the visits, I haven't been to those in ages but I went to one with my parents this time. It usually consists of a few small visits and the one large gathering. The gatherings usually are a mix of Iraqis and the conversations are just "things would have been so much better if i was in control".. so almost like these posts but in a more animated version. It's great being a spectator in these things, but sometimes you're get fed up how every single topic thats started ends up transforming into something to do with the situation in Iraq. Though it was quite an interesting mix there, but towards the end I was listening more to the conversations going on in kurdish (well actually its mainly cos' that's where i sat down to eat and didn't bother getting up.. i was bloated and it was a good seat i didn't want it to be taken) though i am beggining to realise how difficult badinani dialect is (piling u must be a genius to have learned it, its almost a different language.. i had to make sure i was giving the right reactions to the questions). Anyway so the stuff most people say are a mixture between things they've seen first hand and stuff they've heard from their family.

So for example there's a rumor out there that the Burtuqala guy has been killed, and just in case it happens to be true i can tell u it wasn't me. In fact it wasn't even for the same reason i would have went ahead with (hypothetically speaking) no these are the same people who are also threatening hairdressers and other people whose main job doesn't lead automatically to death and destruction.

Also people saying that houses in their area keep getting rented out... and not just for people. There are people out there paying way too much money to rent places just to store weapons. So basically even when the place does get attacked there's hardly any criminals in them and the neighbouring houses suffer instead. Yes this is the peak of bravery they keep going on about.

Another topic is why baathee pees (filthy baathists) were back in the system again. Ppl who were forced to be baathist back in the game might be ok but now we get the really strong baathist supporters in everything: the media, the army, the police and the government. There are even people who work in foreign embassies who were asking others to help them in aiding the Muqawama/resistance. So the conversation was like why don't they at least keep these ppl under their thumb, you know make them do the donkey-work but never give them any authority anywhere... hmm though im thinking now wouldn't it be better to keep them on a leash.. possibly one that can be used as a noose later.

And the stuff about how they're lucky that the kurds so far have come out clean from all this and some guy was like aah ma wait till they're done with this fallujah oo malluja, then they'll all combine and start pestering us.
So the conversation drifted off about this airline that may go to hawler(arbil) sometime soon, except the problem is it MUST stop in baghdad first, and the way its going no one is willing to pay that much money to stop in baghdad. Apparently its because the americans will have it no other way. And here (well it was this topic and the american treatment to the peshmerga after the war) it turned into "when will these americans ever learn", "they behead their ppl and they can't wait to run after them", someone must find out why they hate us so much. And another guy was trying to reason well you know maybe the americans have been pressured by 21 arabs countries and 6 turkish ones (i haven't checked that are they really six) so the other replied "pfft these countries pressuring america, the states has no problems wearing those countries like shoes (well how else do you translate lapayan daka) when it comes to israel and look how hated they are by the region".

The happening in he other cities of Iraq have been taking a back seat to other news stories such as fallujah and the death of arafat, actually a small note on the last one, he may be a symbol for the palestinian cause and while the hero/villian thing can be left to ppl involved in the palestine-israel conflict, a freedom-fighter he was not. Saddam and his policies affected every single family in iraq and what saddam did to iraq was far worse than wat israel has done to palestine. What kind of freedom-fighter happily supported a man who committed all this and still aspired to occupy and oppress more land (like iran and kuweit). Ok and yes I know everyone else supported it as well, but they came in forms other than freedom-fighters. Anyway I always thought someone like Edward Said(a palestinian-american professor at Columbia who wrote extensively about Palestinian and arab issues and passed away this time last year) was a far better representative of the palestinian ppl anyway.

Back to fallujah, you know what else is strange these aid, we "heart" human rights ppl don't seem to be giving a damn about the fallujah refugees that have settled temporarily in Lake habaniya and instead are hooting and orgasming about inside fallujah, where so far there hasn't been a sign of any civilians. The only unconfirmed report is this supposed doctor who called from fallujah saying he's winessed a massacre and instead of calling the red cross/crescent or doing his job has decided to call jazeera instead. All the other embedded reporters have so far seen a ghost town. But what do we have on the other hand... slaughter houses, hostages tied up in fallujan homes, foreign fighters, possible (yet unconfirmed) beheading of 3 more kurds, an as yet unknown limbless and decapitated female body thrown in the streets, stashes of weapons and explosives in mosques and homes, and a member of Association of Muslim Scholars (abdullah janabi) on the run with Abu Musaab zarqawi. So romeo has finally eloped with juliet..or umm julian yes julian
But just wait those basically mean nothing because you can not question the methods or the point of the ever holy resistance.

To make things worse, ever since fallujah has been attacked these runaway terrorists (sorry brave resistance) have been fleeing like cockroaches to other surrounding cities and working freelance over there. The only place that has so far not been attacked successfully were the PUK headquarters which were guarded by the pesshmerga. Yes the same peshmerga that were meant to be disbanded and forced to join the Iraqs badly trained security forces. I can not believe they agreed to give 1 billion dollars to Jordan last year to "train" 30,000 iraqis, what was this trainng about anyway how to be butchered by their people or how to be infiltrated my baathists and islamists. Anyway Jordan was also paid to produce news textbooks to Saddam (why? because the think the whole of Iraq doesn't own a printing press). It's been two school years already and nothing has been seen from them yet.
The peshmerga were also forced out of mosul and kirkuk after the fall of saddam anyway cos it may piss off turkey
So thats just nice let the iraqis keep on dying but oh no don't dare hurt the feelings of our neighboring countries. Love the way how the whole livelihood of iraqis dependant on what makes these countries moist.

Alot of kurds are divided on whether it is right to send the peshmerga or not (thats it they're allowed to in the first place). On one hand they think well the peshmerga are so far the only ones capable of putting an end to this and we don't want to contain this slaughtering disease before it even spreads across to kurdistan. But on the other hand they think that well if the peshmerga do get involved we would just be giving the racist arabs among them (i repeat I’m not generalizing alot of arabs are not fed on racism, but its the racist ones who never ever liked us that are going to be doing most of the screaming and shrieking later), and they'll use it as an excuse to raise hell on us either media-wise or though their pajmahideen. Just wait till they start blaming all that's wrong with Iraq on the kurds.

They've been provoking most of the minorities and the rest of the community since the end of the war, its also shown here by an email kurdo recently received from the coordinator of "kurdistan save the children fund". The kurds speciically by their "oh they want to steal our land" mantra, like they've done a really good job with this "land" ever since they kicked the other minorities out of it many decaded ago. This ethnic cleansing of kirkuk has been going on ever since oil was discovered but it just reach its intense levels in saddams reign. Ok so what do we have now a rich diverse city (back in the 50s-60s period) has been changed into a dry destitute poverty stricken small version of its former self. None of kirkuk's resources were ever used on the city, it was either used to fund the military, or saddam close buddies or sent abroad to feed the greedy mouthpieces of the former regime. So what exactly are they missing, they can't even protect or learn how to use their own funds. I say let the city be diverse again, let the refugees return and then decide which part it blelongs to. This "one race only" trump card that they love using isn't doing anyone any favours they don't even know how to protect themselves. For example alot of the mosques in Kirkuk are guarded by christians rather than the muslims (and this is practically their only duty) and just look at how Christians are paid back.

I have no idea but am hoping that Iraq will one day be a better country and it really hurts to see that there are many many families who will be spending their Eid attending funerals or welcome well-wishers.

I received this via email from Maureen McLuckie the co-ordinator of KSF.

"I was introduced to a delegation of six men who are Kurdish but whose religion is Yezidis.
Yezidis belong to the pr-Islamic period. It is one of the ancient monotheistic religions, and their tradition has been passed down by word of mouth. .

In the pre-Islamic period the Kurds followed various religions. Kurds were Yezidis, Zoroastrians, and Judaism, Christianity also were very popular among the Kurds. But when the Kurds were converted to Islam in the year 637 the Yezidis never converted

Today there are some 350,000 living in the Shingar area about 120 km from Mosul in Northern Iraq. At the moment they come under the Iraqi area and not the Kurdish area. In 1975 the Baathist party under Saddam Hussein destroyed 159 villages and the population of the villages were herded into 12 compounds where they still live today. They have never had water inside these compounds and they still have to buy the water from the tankers that regular come by. 95% of the population are unemployed.

In the other villages that were left in tact the names of the villages were changed from Kurdish to Arabic, after the fall of the regime in 2003 the Yezidis wanted to change the names of their villages back to Kurdish they have denied permission to do so by the Mosul Government.

A few days ago all the Moslem children in the schools were giving school bags containing pens, pencils etc, the Kurdish children were told that they would have to get them from the Kurdish Government. The young girls have been told they have to wear the Hijab, which is the long black dress and the covering of the head and shoulders.
These 6 men had come to Sulaimaniya to seek help. I was told that the Mosul administration was practicing discrimination against the Yezidis not only because they are Yezidis but because they are also Kurds. The only employment in the area is the cement factory which apparently is the biggest factory of its kind the in Middle East, out of 460 employees there are only 49 Kurds and the director has decided that no other Kurds are to be employed.

I was really furious when they told me this, the Kurds are a very proud race and these men are very well educated so it must be really very embarrassing for them to have to come and ask someone like me for help. So much for the new Iraq wanting democracy.

KSC is going to put a plans together for a school and I will then try and get some funding for them, I'm not quite sure who from but I shall try. The Kurdish Administration has told me they will provide the furniture and schools books if I can raise the money for the school to be built but if anyone else can raise some money than it will be greatly appreciated."


To send funds contact :
email :mcluckm_kcf@yahoo.co.uk

Maureen McLuckie
Administrator
Kurdistan Children's Fund
www.ksc-kcf.org
0044 20 8688 3547

Please contact media outlets !

Medya's back and has an interesting post regarding kurds and palestinians. Also, a new blogger called Asavin has just started blogging, here's an excerpt:
For next few months you can follow me when I accomplish my first investment in Kurdistan ever since I left my homeland for about 12 years ago. This is probably the biggest investment I have ever made in my life, either I fall or I will win a better future.

Read more here

I'm really hoping this offensive can be over and done with soon, of course it should have started much much earlier but this is exactly what you get when u leave borders open and just poo-poo the mullahs and their funding countries for so long. And to think a few months back the kurds were about to be sold out to these form of scum.
There are also people out these who wanted iraq to wait a "little more".. may i ask for what ?! They've already kidnapped (and will most likely kill) the members of the PM allawi's family, they kill our security forces, they mutilate kill aid workers and anyone who wants to help iraq.. wait i take that back they kill anything that moves,they target places of worship and they behead iraqis by the dozen...what exactly should we be waiting a little more for till every single sensible Iraqi is dead? These "outcries" shouldn't be taken seriously since they are the same people who still wish saddam was in power and our depressed that his temporary replacements might be removed as well.

Of course I wish the american and iraqi forces may have provided some aid or temporary accomodation for the refugees fleeing the city (i dunno about security but they have the funds and the man power to provide something to these ppl, at least encourage more of the innocent to leave, not everyone has a home to go to) and I don't like the idea of kurds dying for the sake of a shitfest like fallujah but regarding these criminals... I can't wait till every single one of their decaying corpses are pushing litter in a garbage dump somewhere... probably on the borders of the neighbouring country that has provide and/or funded them . I may be even a little more biased today since i've had some distubing personal news today that has put me in the mood to get a cheese grater and mutilate every single resitance sympathiser in my sight, i think its better not to go into any more detail since im bound to go into a fully blown racist tirade.

Good move but about 19 months and too many lives too late (read the latest about what our tv channels refer to as "al muqawama al shareefa" have done). But please let this be done and over with once and for all. Of course with all those reporters they've let in, I think its a good time to boycott jazeera et al.

Now all Iraq apart from kurdistan are subject to the emergency law. Good: Proves to still be the safest part of Iraq, even though almost everyone hates to admit it.
Not so good: A pretty good oppurtunity for the last of our pesky and bloodthirsty neighbors to start meddling in Iraqi, especially kurdish, issues. Maybe it's just paranoia but lets hope that the turkish border isn't left unattended.
You see kurdistan has never been this quiet for such a long period of time so alot of ppl are thinking that it's a really ominous sign. Turkey has had it in for Iraq (mainly the kurds) since the beginning of the war but so far have been trying indirect ways like planting false media claims, stirring up hate through parties they fund and smuggling troops across the border . All have so far failed. Hopefully with all this EU talk they've decided to pause for a while. But if something were to happen lets hope they get the same reception from the turkmen they did last time turkey's involvement was mentioned.

Also the al iraqiya channel broadcasted taped confessions from 19 foreign fighter criminals . They include iranians, syrians, saudis and jordanians. It really annoys me that when dealing with the borders issue we should somehow abstain from naming the countries that are in good terms with america.. ok their governments are pro-american but so what ? It's costing everyone very dearly.i mean saudia arabia and jordan for example they're the main countries giving us the bulk of the problem (zarqawi and wahhabis, need i say more) and yet its almost a no-no to mention it. Why can't the US throw a "we'll stop exporting to u ppl" card when dealing with this problem, I mean we have zarqawi and his slaughtering troupe hopping around the iraq-jordan border and no ones even allowed to question jordan's involvement in these terror activities, well how can we with them constantly being labeled as a secular modern pro-western freedom loving nation and all.

There's actually a bunch of stuff i was planning to write about so I've decided to put them altogether.

1) Kidnappings and beheadings

Margaret Hassan to be handed over to Zarqawi

I just find this extremely painful, especially since her last video was declared demeaning even by the most demeaning of beings such as Jazeera. I still don't understand how scum could sink that low. What more do they want from this woman.

And to even make the day more painful more Iraqis beheaded by these animal organizations. What is there to say about a country when the only people trying to help it are executed by batch.

I think it’s about time we start hiring some bulldozers and razing every single Assoc of muslims neglibles as soon as possible, everyone knows they are responsible even fay7aa tv aired confessions from 12 jailed members of ansar al sunna who all claimed to get their orders directly from Ziad Dulaimy (not sure about the exact name) a leading member of this dreaded organization.

2)George Bush re-elected into the white house
Unless something really odd happens in the next coming weeks this is the way it stands. But I must say what an extremely dignified final speech by Kerry, we were watching it and my Dad was saying "see this is how democracy works".
Though It took a long time didn't it? For some reason I thought the entire thing was going to be electronic and the results would have showed at the click of a button. The campaign was pretty interesting , though one part I found particularly uncomfortable was the blood mathematics, each one using all these tragic deaths to their advantage.
Here it was funny hearing family and relatives commenting on the appearances of kerry and bush you kow about bush not looking too serious or whether his wife has had botox or saying something like "aw chakmaja chiya" (whats this drawer) referring to kerry's chin everytime he showed up on tv. His chin has been a pretty important part in this household.

To be honest I was pretty neutral to the entire thing. I know nothing about their domestic agendas but to us middle eastern mountain dwelling folk, it's foreign policy that matters and that usually stays more or less stable no matter which administration is in place. The bad side of that is that many dictatorships around here would still be receiving aid and support but on the flipside neither one of them would have been willing to let go of Iraq just yet.
Though from all the media regarding it, it looked like no one in the world supported bush, so i see some justified media-thrashing about to happen.

Here's hoping and wishing for a much better next 4 years.

As you know most kurds are pro-Bush because he removed Saddam something that would have sounded very very fictitious a couple of years ago.
Also the other reasons being the pronunciation (or mispronunciation) of kerry's name. Actually maybe Kerry should have won at least we would have finally learned to pronounce properly. See kurds in general are really good at piking up new languages (well mainly cos we have to) but our enunciations are plain horrible. Especially when we try putting foreign words into our language, We change "E's to "I's" , mess up vowels, add and remove letters as we please. Words like prossa (instead of process.. which surprisingly has officially become a kurdish word) and Madonal (instead of mcdonald.. and we've went as far as opening up a restaurant under that name as well) Or how about this new addition... 70's scandinavian sounding L's (think of this sound.... ELLL) AS IN festivELLLL , carnivELLL, MadonaeLL

3) The passing away of the UAE ruler, Sheikh Zayed

I was just watching the funeral processions on arabic satellite, it was pretty simple. And you can see the ppl are genuinely saddened by his loss.
None of that extreme self beating, no larger than life photos, just many many ppl flocking towards the mosque for funeral prayers and then following his casket to burial.

Why am I mentioning this? Mainly cos Iraqis love using the UAE as an example of a country at extreme opposite ends with theirs. Sheikh Zayed has taken a country that was pretty much uninhabited 30 yrs ago and transformed it into an international hub as well as the most advanced multicultural country in the region. During the same timeframe we had a president who took the most advanced multicultural country in the region and transformed it into desolate rubble.

Remember the UAE only had one resource and that was Oil and look how far it got them while Iraq is an ocean of resources from oil to corps to land to the people and yet we have been thrown back hundreds of years. All this death and destruction and for what? just to get a bunch of lobotomized simians worked up about pride, unity, glory and other non-existent traits.

4)Saddam's legal team sacks top man

One word to summarise the following : BWHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

How shitty must you be to be dumped by... garbage basically. Mohammed Rashdan is responsible for giving Iraqis of all religions and ethnicities diarrhea every time they switch on one of their channels and now he's been given the boot. To make this even more pathetically hilarious the other members were pissed off why he was stealing the limelight, what kind of person wants to "shine" defending a mass murdurer. Hopefully this league of froth will start turning against each other and cancel each other out one by one... if only iraq was a real country these ppl would be standing trial as well.