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“The United States is very popular now in Iraqi Kurdistan.” |
WASHINGTON,
August 14 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – Exactly a week after
stating that he wouldn’t give the U.S. blind support for striking
Iraq, a prominent Iraqi Kurdish leader said Tuesday, August 13, he has
offered Washington the use of military bases controlled by his group for
a possible U.S. attack on the regime of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
Jalal
Talabani, head of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, told CNN the U.S.
response was positive to his offer of bases in exchange for protection
from possible retaliation with chemical or biological weapons, reported
Agence France-Presse (AFP).
He
said he has assured Washington the U.S. troops would be welcomed. “The
American army will be very warmly welcomed in Iraqi Kurdistan, in
contrary to the rumors,” Talabani told CNN.
“It
will be welcomed and believe me the United States is very popular now in
Iraqi Kurdistan.”
Talabani
and other Iraqi opposition leaders met over the weekend with U.S.
officials amid signs Washington is planning to attack Iraq, although
U.S. President George W. Bush insists no decision has been made, said
AFP.
Most
of northern Iraq has been outside Baghdad’s control since a Kurdish
uprising following the 1991 Gulf War.
Washington
has repeatedly accused Iraq of harboring terrorists and developing
biological and chemical weapons since disarmament inspectors fled on the
eve of sustained U.S. air strikes in December 1998.
Bush
has called for a change of regime in Iraq “by any means necessary,”
but also has promised to consult allies and the U.S. Congress before
taking any action.
On
August 7, Talabani said that his faction would not support anticipated
U.S. moves against Iraq if they failed to install democracy in the
sanctions-hit and isolated country.
The
comments came just ahead of his meeting with the Iraqi opposition in
Washington.
“What
we are concerned about is to hear from the Americans that they want a
democratic united Iraq. This is very important for us,” he said.
He
reiterated concerns on who would succeed Saddam were he to be ousted and
underlined his opposition to “having a new dictatorship replacing the
old one”.
“We
are not for blindly participating in any attack or plan,” the PUK
leader added.
Washington’s
threats have also led to unease in Turkey, a key U.S. ally battling a
severe economic crisis with early elections set for November, which
fears the economic and political fallout of a war in its southern
neighbor, said AFP.
Turkey,
which hosts a major U.S. air base, is concerned that turmoil in Iraq
could lead to an independent Kurdish state in northern Iraq, which has
been outside Baghdad’s control since the 1991 Gulf War under the
protection of a western-enforced no-fly zone.
Such
a development could fan separatist sentiment among Kurds in Turkey’s
southeast and rekindle a recently subdued Kurdish rebellion for
self-rule. But Talabani denied such a possibility and sought to allay
Turkey’s fears.
“We
want to reunite Iraq and we are for the independence of Iraq, for
national integrity and sovereignty. We are not struggling for an
independent Kurdistan,” he said.
The
U.K. newspaper, the Guardian said Sunday, August 11, that the Kurdish
guerillas in Iraq, known as peshmergas, are working day and night
hauling sandbags, digging trenches and bulldozing mountain roads to
their front lines, getting ready for war.
According
to the paper, the guerillas are preparing for the upcoming war by an
opening battle in which they are preparing to crush an Islamic group,
known as Ansar al-Islam which, the paper says, has seized territory on
the Iraqi-Iranian border and which some claim provides evidence of a
link between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.
The
paper quoted Iraqi Kurdish sources saying that they need to move quickly
to crush the Muslim group because, if a U.S.-led attack on Saddam
begins, all peshmerga forces will be needed to surge southwards into
government-controlled Iraq. They do not want to face a war on two
fronts, it added.
