Dozens of guns, 20,000+ ammo seized from 3 Iraqi Kurdish Britons in Greece near the Turkey border.

Dozens of guns, 20,000+ ammo seized from 2 Britons in Greece coming from the Turkey border. (RT).

Greece’s coast guard has reportedly arrested three “heavily armed” British men carrying more than a dozen guns and thousands of rounds of ammunition from Turkey, a top security official said.

A high-ranking security official told AP that the suspects were both Iraqi-born British subjects in their 20s. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment on the ongoing investigation.
The two were arrested Saturday night by coast guard officers near the port of the Greek city of Alexandroupolis, off the Turkish border.
The two suspects were driving a trailer loaded with more than a dozen guns of an unspecified type and well over 20,000 rounds of ammunition, the security official said. According to preliminary reports, the load included “3 magnum 357 handguns.” The number has not yet been confirmed by any other sources or official statements.

The two suspects are reportedly not on any terrorist or criminal database.

Police counterterrorist elements and National Intelligence Agency officers were scrambled to head for Alexandroupolis, AP reported.

Keep Talking Greece has more details:

Three men, holders of British passports, were arrested in the town of Alexandroupolis near the Greek-Turkish border on Saturday. All three suspects were reportedly heavily armed and two trailers they were driving were transporting dozens of weapons and thousands of bullets.

The first arrest occurred on Saturday, with the Greek Coastguard to have handcuffed two men, aged 22 and 28 years old, Iraqi-born and holders of British passports. They were reportedly arrested driving a trailer carrying dozens of guns (3 Magnum revolver 357 and some 15 revolver 22) as well as 27,000 bullets.

The trailer had been allegedly “parked at the port of Alexandroupolis for 2-3 days,” while the men were staying in a local hotel. According to Greek media, the local coastguard had the two men under surveillance due to “suspect moves.” Brought before the prosecutor the men did not originally give information about their destination or any explanation as to why they were heavily armed.

However, they reportedly hinted to a third man, also holder of a British passport. Police arrested him at the Kipoi customs point to Turkey. The third Kurd, 39, was also driving a trailed and was in possession of four Kalashnikov, more than 200,000 bullets and night binoculars. One of the suspects was in Alexandroupolis since beginning of February.

It looks as if none of the three was on Interpol’s Wanted list or otherwise known to European authorities as “terrorists.”

The three denied that they had any connection to the Islamic State and they apparently claimed during the interrogation that they were bringing the weapons to a group of Kurds in Syria.

According to latest reports by state ERT TV (12 o’ clock News):

The three suspects are Iraqi-born Kurds with British passports, Kurds fighting against the Islamic State.

Experts from counter-terrorism and the national intelligence are reportedly heading to Alexandroupolis. Local Alexpoli.gr, implies that also ‘foreign experts’ rush to the city in the Greek North.

UPDATES

Greek police found documents suggesting the route of the three suspects to Greece:

a domestic flight ticket Diyarbakir-Istanbul (Turkey), dated Jan 10th 2016

a receipt from a shop in Germany, dated Jan 25th 2016

a ferry ticket Italy – Igoumenista port (Greece) dated Feb 2nd 2016

a highway toll ticket from Malgara, near Thessaloniki

There are indications that the three bought the weapons and ammunition either in Germany where they were a month ago or in Austria. They have not named so far the seller or the final destination of the weapons.

They have reportedly told police that they would earn 3,000 euro per person for the delivery of the arsenal and that the seller gave them the cars for moving the trailers around as a “present”.

sources: Mega Tv 2 pm news, ERT TV 3 pm News

The suspects declare that they are translators. And they want interrogation to be held in Kurdish and not in English. Interrogation continues.

The arrests occur just two weeks after two Isis suspects with Swedish passports were arrested also in Alexandroupolis, some 15 km away from the Greek-Turkish borders in north-eastern Greece.

The two men, one from Bosnia and one from Yemen were carrying one machete and military uniforms in their luggage. The man from Bosnia was known to European authorities to have connections with the Al-Qaida in the Balkans and he had also convicted.

"The worst thing I have ever seen" eyewitness of first ISIS death penalty by stoning.

Illustrative picture , source 

"The worst thing I have ever seen" eyewitness of first ISIS death by stoning.(Niqash).

An open invitation had been issued by the bearded gunmen roaming the streets of the Bab Al Sham neighbourhood in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul: Come and watch the first death by stoning in this town, they said.

Mosul was taken over by Sunni Muslim extremists from the group now known as the Islamic State in early June, when Iraqi army forces fled the metropolis. Since then the extremists have established their own set of rules and their version of strict religious Islamic law.

And late last week the group’s gunmen had been inviting everyone who passed by them in the Bab Al Sham neighbourhood in Mosul to come and watch some of their “justice” in action. At first local man Abdallah says he had not taken them seriously. But the 36-year-old who cannot give his full name for security reasons was curious. And soon he saw some members of the extremist group collecting stones in a yard, near a main street that was crowded with people.

Abdallah told NIQASH the stoning was the worst thing he had ever seen in his life. “I was told to sit down and there were hundreds of other people doing the same thing, waiting for the Iqamat al-Had [the application of Islamic law]. A circle was formed and there were a lot of masked gunmen around,” he describes the scene.

“While we were watching the militants moving around, collecting stones and organizing seating for everyone, two of the masked men dragged a young, blind folded man in behind them,” Abadallah continues. “He was pleading for mercy and yelling loudly and everyone could hear him screaming. After stoning him they hit him with one big rock and killed him.”

“The people of Mosul have grown used to the extremist group’s methods,” says one of the city’s Muslim clerics, who is now living in Dohuk after fleeing Mosul. “They announce their crimes before they commit them, as they did when they destroyed various shrines in the city and when they chased the Christians out of the city.”

“Executions of those who are sentenced to death by the extremists’ judges have usually been kept secret though,” explains the cleric whose name must remain anonymous for security reasons. “The Had is usually carried out in an unknown place and the corpse is only returned afterwards. After that, the extremists call the family’s victim so they can come and get the body.”

“But now,” the cleric tells NIQASH, “things seem to be different. The extremists have announced that they will start applying the religious verdicts in public. Basically they are doing this to terrorise the people of the city and force them to obey their orders.”

One of the worst penalties is being stoned to death. In this case, the victim was a young man named Marwan.

“The young man was brought into the middle of the yard and his hands and feet were tied,” Abdallah describes the scene. “A preacher started to say that this married man had committed adultery and that’s why he was being punished. It is the responsibility of the guardian of the Muslims to punish him, he said – and by that, he means Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi,” Abdallah explains.

“The young man began crying and shouting,” Abdallah continued. “But the preacher kept calling out “Allahu Akbar” and people were repeating it so loudly that by the end, you couldn’t hear the young man’s voice any more. He was trying to untie his hands and legs but one of the gunmen came closer to him and stopped him.”

The story of the terrible event spread around the city quickly. People were talking about how the gunmen were throwing rocks at the young man’s head with all their strength.

“A lot of the people turned away because they couldn’t stand to see such a savage scene. They couldn’t stand to see the victim in such pain,” Abdallah recalls.

After about 20 minutes, it was all over. Everything was still except for the blood pooling underneath the young man’s head. The preacher took the young man’s pulse and made a sign to the gunmen that they could leave; the man was dead. SUVs carrying black flags started to depart while songs of victory were played on their car stereos.

One of the Islamic State group’s members had filmed the whole thing, from start to finish. No doubt the footage would later be disseminated online both to terrorize those who opposed the IS group and appeal to those who the group is trying to recruit.

The young man’s body was then transported by ambulance to Mosul’s morgue. NIQASH spoke to some of the employees there. They’re used to seeing dead people but even they were surprised at the severity of the injuries to the man’s head and face.

“He suffered a lot before his death,” one of them said sadly.

It has also made the people of Mosul sure that this will not be the last savagery they will see from the IS group in coming days. They fear that soon they will start seeing people hanged on power poles, appendages amputated and crucifixions in the so-called Caliphate.   Hmmm......Obama "I don't have a strategy"....Patton has a great one: "A good plan violently executed now is better than perfect plan next week."

ISIS members confess horrific crimes and confirm collaboration with Turkish intelligence.

State sponsors of terrorism

ISIS members confess horrific crimes and confirm collaboration with Turkish intelligence. (firatajans).

A documentary broadcast on STERK TV last night entitled 'Gang of Degenerates' contained the horrific confessions of more than 20 members of ISIS regarding the inhuman methods of the organisation.

The ISIS operatives were captured by Rojava public security and YPG forces. References to history were made in the documentary to Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein', published in 1818, where a monster is constructed using remnants left on the battlefield and parts collected from slaughterhouses. It was emphasised that global forces are behind this.

Their biggest weapon is causing fear and terror

Attention was drawn in the documentary to the fact ISIS's most effective weapon is its ability to create fear and terror by means of its methods, such as random killings regardless of gender, age, religion or ethnicity, its decapitations, rapes and burying people alive. The gangs do not feel a need to conceal what they have perpetrated, on the contrary they publish their atrocities so that more people can see them.

With whom did ISIS come to agreement regarding Sinjar?

Şêrko Xêredîn Silêman, an active member of ISIS, mentioned bargaining being carried out over Sinjar following the capture of Mosul. The striking thing is these confessions were recorded prior to the gangs' attacks on Sinjar. Silêman claims ISIS reached agreement with the government in South Kurdistan regarding Sinjar, saying: ‘Before they were opposed to each other, but then they came to an agreement. The Iraqi Kurdistan government and ISIS made an alliance. They Iraqi Kurdistan government said: "let's give them Sinjar, so that they don't bother us and we don't bother them."

Şêrko Xêredîn Silêman claims he was trained by Parastin, the intelligence organisation of South Kurdistan, and sent to Rojava to carry out joint operations.

‘They have contact points in Cizre, Adana and Urfa'

The gang members also made revealing claims regarding Turkish support for ISIS, saying Turkey does not only provide a safe corridor, but also supplies all manner of logistical support. They said they had worked closely with Turkish intelligence and could bring weapons from Turkey whenever they wished.

Mihemed Yûsif Vazo said they had contact points in Cizre, Adana and Urfa. Another gang member, Ebdulkerîm Îbrahîm, said he had been to Turkey 3 times, bringing back weapons on each occasions.

ISIS representative works with intelligence in Adana

Yûsif Vazo explained how an ISIS representative from Rakka worked with intelligence operatives in the city of Adana to ensure a supply of arms. He added that Turkey was used as a transit point for ISIS members.

They count the rapes as ‘marriage'!

The most lurid part of the documentary was the part in which gang members gave their 'marriage' numbers in addition to their names and ISIS membership numbers. For instance, Cinêd Cemîl Silêman said his membership number was 333, while his marriage number was 583.

Mihemed Sebah Hebeş said his membership number was 500, and his marriage number was 400.

The ISIS members admitted that what they called 'marriage' was in fact rape. They said that every new member of the organisation was raped. The footage of the rape would be used as blackmail in the event of the new recruit refusing to participate in actions.

20-year-old Ferhan Salim Unûf Safên said he had been abducted by Silêman Kohnê, Ebû Qûteybe and Cinêd Cemîl and suffered multiple rapes. "I fainted. When I came round they told me: 'you are now with ISIS in Jazaa.' They told me to join. I said it was not possible. They did terrible thiungs to me. Things even the Americans didn't do in Abu Graib. Things even the Israelis haven't done to the Palestinians. I'm ashamed to explain them. There were 6 or 7 of them. Their faces were covered. They 'married me' about ten times!"

Ebdulkerîm Îbrahîm Bazo said 'marriage' was a rule in order to be a member of the organisation. Bazo said the 'wedding' was carried out like a ceremony, adding: "those who did it to me said I had gained morale and strength to fight."

Rapes recorded for use in blackmail

Bazo added that the footage recorded was used as blackmail. He said: "Silêman Kohnê took me to a village, where my 'marriage' was performed by Hecî Newaf Mele Mehmûd. They blindfolded me and carried out the wedding. About a fortnight later they came and said I had to participate in the organisation. I didn't want to. But they had the footage. They threatened to show it to my family."

Ehmed Hisên explained horrifying incidents; "I'm from the Sharbaniyan tribe in Malikiyê (Derik). Silêman Kohnê proposed that I join ISIS some time ago. But I told him I was newly married and did not want to be involved in such things. I was then abducted and drugged. When I came to I was in a room which stank terribly. They wouldn't let me leave the room. Five people came in and told me I should join the organisation, I refused. Then they tortured me. They extinguished cigarettes on my body. Such things were not done to Iraqis at Guantanamo. You would think I was an infidel. They blindfolded and stripped me. They 'married' me 15 times. Then they washed my head and put cologne on me. They told me no one could join ISIS without being married. Then they recited very strange verses of the Quran. As they spoke I imagined images of severed heads. They spoke academic Arabic."

‘Kill the Kurds and throw them in the Tigris'

The confessions also illustrated the way ISIS members are indoctrinated with hostility to Kurds. One of the captured members of ISIS said that during 'education' sessions Kurds were described as 'infidels' and that they had been told: 'kill the Kurds and throw them in the Tigris. They're not Moslem so it's permissible to kill them.'

Some of the ISIS members who spoke were captured during a bomb attack in Derik.

Silêman Mihemed Kohne, who was mentioned in relation to the rape incidents, was also captured and gave details of the bomb attack, intended to kill civilians, during which a nephew of a gang leader was killed. The attack was also recorded. The documentary 'Gang of Degenerates' concluded that: "despite the support of global and regional powers for the murderous ISIS gangs, they have been unable to achieve strategic success against the Kurds. The brutality and wave of fear they have created has turned to ice as it struck the walls of resistance in Kurdistan," showing footage of the defeats suffered by the ISIS gangs in Rojava and South Kurdistan.

Autonomous Kurdish entity to be declared inside Syria?

Autonomous Kurdish entity to be declared inside Syria?(HD).By Emine KART.

Turkey is not categorically against the formation of an autonomous Kurdish entity inside Syria as long as this decision is made at a Parliament representing the nation’s will, Turkish officials have said.

For the moment, Turkey is against any kind of fait accompli regarding such a formation in an environment of chaos inside the neighboring country, the officials said after talks with Salih Muslim, the co-leader of the main Kurdish group in northern Syria, the Democratic Union Party (PYD).

During the same meeting, Turkish officials responded positively to the PYD side’s requests for humanitarian aid to reach Rojava (the Kurdish name for the Syrian Kurdish enclaves in the northern part of the country), but no tangible result has been reported.

Muslim held a meeting with officials from the Foreign Ministry and the National Intelligence Service (MİT) Aug. 14, marking the second such meeting openly hosted in Turkey after the first one in late July. Particularly taking into consideration the once harsh rhetoric against the PYD by Ankara, a considerable number of analysts interpreted these meetings and the lack of secrecy of the past few meetings as a policy change rather than fine-tuning.
During talks with Turkish officials, Muslim reiterated that they are not seeking autonomy or independence, as he maintained that “their requests concerning the future will be pursued inside Syria and the decision concerning Syria’s future will be made together by all Syrians,” Turkish diplomatic sources told the semi-official Anadolu Agency late Aug. 14.

Yet, according to news reports posted from Qamishli in northern Syria only a few hours earlier on Aug. 14, the PYD’s other co-leader, Asia Abdulla, said they were in the second stage of declaring self-autonomy. Elections will be held once all parties involved are approved, Abdulla said.
“Her statements are not binding for me. Our counterpart is Muslim and likewise at the previous meeting, Muslim told us that what they have been demanding right now is not a demand for autonomy. They have been forming a local and non-permanent committee in order to provide for the needs of their people. This is something acceptable as long as they do not attempt to turn this non-permanent structure into a different body as a fait accompli,” a senior Turkish diplomat told the Hürriyet Daily News Aug. 15 when reminded of the contradiction between Muslim’s reported remarks and Abdulla’s reported prospects.

“Autonomy is a decision that shall be made by the free will of the people of Syria and when it is eventually made in a free Syria, then Turkey will have no problem with it,” the same diplomat, speaking under customary condition of anonymity, said, echoing remarks recently delivered by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu.Read the full story here.

‘No friends but the mountains’: Washington seeks to ensnare Kurds after supporting Turkey's crackdown on them.

‘No friends but the mountains’: Washington seeks to ensnare Kurds after supporting Turkey's crackdown on them.HT: RussiaToday.

The Kurdish Democratic Union Party and other sources are now reporting that Kurdish men, women, and children are systematically being tortured, raped, and executed. Fighting has broken out between Syrian Kurds and the insurgent forces supported by the US, UK, France, Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and the Iranian Parliament have condemned the targeting of Syrian Kurds while the Obama Administration and its cohorts have remained mostly silent. Lavrov’s insistence that the United Nations Security Council condemns the violence has also been to no avail.
One of the reasons that the Obama Administration has been silent is because they are supporting the butchers behind the massacre and are trying to avoid more embarrassment. The US and its allies, however, will make supportive noise for the Kurds once they get the result they are seeking.

Turkey in the last decade has slowly loosened its repressive policies against the Kurds as part of its neo-Ottoman bid to expand its economic and political influence in the Middle East. Ankara’s government has even instigated the Iraqi Kurds to clash with the Iraqi federal government, whereas it has been unsuccessful in its attempts to entice the Syrian Kurds into its orbit. It is even alleged that Prime Minister Erodogan had devised a Turkish-Kurdish federation of some sort that would eventually incorporate Iraqi Kurdistan and Syrian Kurdistan with Turkey. 

The US government has constantly changed its position on the Kurds. In coordination with the Shah of Iran, Washington actually armed the Iraqi Kurds and led them on. The moment that the Shah got his concessions, the US dropped the Iraqi Kurds by ending its support. The US then started to support Saddam Hussein against the Iraqi Kurds and, under the guise of giving agricultural credits, effectively armed him with the chemical weapons that he used against them and Iran. After America turned its back on Saddam Hussein, the US pushed the Kurds to rebel against Baghdad, only to abandon them once more by leaving them during their hour of need in a position of deadlock. The US and UK would go on to use the Kurds as a convenient excuse for establishing their illegal no-fly zones over Iraq and later to support their invasion in 2003.
Ironically, while Washington condemned Saddam Hussein for mistreating the Kurds, it actually supported and helped the Turkish government against the Kurds in both Turkey and Iraq. Now the Obama Administration is mutely trying to manipulate the Kurds, in Syria and elsewhere, into destabilizing Syria and the Middle East.

Militarizing the Kurds to Fragment Syria

When the troubles in Syria began in 2011, there was an attempt to recruit the Syrian Kurds. The Syrian Kurds were cautious and the recruitment attempts failed. Despite the best attempts of the Syrian National Council and the other puppet opposition groups outside of Syria, the Syrian Kurds were not drawn into the ranks of the insurgency. Instead the Syrian government gave the Kurds a new level of autonomy.
The systematic massacres of Syrian Kurds mark the start of a new strategy to entangle the Kurds in the fighting inside Syria. The targeting of the Syrian Kurds by insurgent groups like Al-Nusra is premeditated and strategically executed precisely with the intention of galvanizing the Kurds in Syria and elsewhere into forming more armed groups and segregating themselves from non-Kurds. In what looks like the momentum towards a broader regional conflagration, the leaders of the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraqi Kurdistan have also threatened to intervene.

There is actually an old and saturnine proverb which is lined to what is happening and, at the same time, speaks to the memory of the Kurdish people about their perception of a tragic history.The proverb avers that the Kurds have no friends except for the mountains. 

The most important thing about this proverb is that it is the axiom for what has been a mentality of besiegement among the Kurds: they have no one to rely on but themselves. This is exactly what the mandarins and strategists conducting the operations against Syria want to exploit the Kurds to feel; they want the Kurds to “have no friends except for the mountains” and to “fight the rest.”  The Arabs, the Turks, and the mixture of ethnic groups that comprise the population of Iran are “the rest.”
While Israeli and US analysts and experts keep parroting the same propaganda talking points that Syria will be divided into sectarian mini-states based on faith and ethnicity, the Syrians themselves are refuting this. What these experts are saying will happen is a goal that Washington and Tel Aviv are in fact struggling to achieve in Syria. In this context, the ultimate aim of dragging the Kurds into fighting is to divide Syria and fragment the Middle East via resurgent and militant Kurdish ethno-nationalism that shouts that the Kurds have no friends. The Kurds should not be fooled into becoming the cannon fodder of those who seek to divide the Middle East. 

They have more friends than just the mountains. Kurdish history, like the history of the world’s other peoples, is one filled with both tragedy and exultation. The long story of the Kurds has not been one of exclusion and discrimination alone. It has been one of inclusion and regional leadership too. It says something when the great eagle that is on Egypt’s flag and used as a pan-Arab symbol and coat of arms by a number of different Arab states is the emblem of the great Kurdish leader Saladin that many of the Middle East’s leaders have been Kurds. Read the full story here.

President Barzani of Iraqi Kurdistan ready to defend Kurds in Syria.

President Barzani of Iraqi Kurdistan ready to defend Kurds in Syria.(RT).

The statement comes days after reports of a possible massacre in Syria.

Barzani said that he wants a committee to be formed to look into reports of violence, and has hinted that the autonomous region of northern Iraq, which has a well-equipped army, would intervene militarily to defend Syrian Kurds.

In a letter which he posted online Saturday on the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) website, he said that he told Kurdish representatives to go to Syria and investigate reports that “terrorists of Al-Qaeda are attacking the civilian population and slaughtering innocent Kurdish women and children.”
“If the reports are true, showing that citizens, women and children of innocent Kurds are under threat from murder and terrorism, Iraq’s Kurdistan region will make use of all its capabilities to defend women and children and innocent civilians,” the letter continued.

As well as being posted online Saturday, the letter was sent on Thursday to the preparatory committee for a Kurdish National Conference to be held later this month in Arbil – located in the far north of Iraqi Kurdistan.
The statement referred to the area of Syria where Kurds live as ‘Western Kurdistan.’ The Kurdish people are spread over adjoining parts of Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran, and are the largest ethnic group in the world without their own state.
Iraqi Kurds have already sent food, medical supplies, and fuel to their Kurdish brethren in Syria but Barzani’s statement is the first time that intervention has been suggested.
There were unconfirmed reports of a massacre earlier this week, in which 450 Kurds were allegedly murdered by Al-Qaeda-linked rebels. According to IranianTV channel Al-Alam, militants from the Jabat Al-Nusra Front attacked the town of Tal Abyad near the Turkish border on Monday, killing 120 children and 330 women. Neither the Syrian government nor the Syrian opposition has confirmed the report.

However, RT managed to get in contact with Kurdish sources who said that increased fighting had taken place in the area.
“The Al-Nusra militants and other rebel forces surrounded the village. They started going door to door, entering every house. If there were any men they killed them and took the women and children hostage,” said the source.
These latest reports follow a statement last month from the Russian Foreign Ministry that Al-Qaeda-linked extremists were holding 200 Kurdish civilians as hostages. The militants were apparently taking revenge for the capture by the Kurds of rebel leader Abu Musab. Five hundred civilians were initially abducted but some were released in agreement with the Kurds, who also released Musab. Around 200 people are believed to still be the hands of the Jihadists.
“In these areas, there has long been confrontation between the troops of the international extremists affiliated with Al-Qaeda and local Kurdish militias who stood up to protect their homes from attacks by radical Islamists,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a July statement.
The Kurds are the main obstacle to the Islamists declaring a de facto state of their own in the northeast of Syria – an area which Syrian President Bashar Assad has little control over.
Barzani’s comments are further proof of how Syria’s two-year conflict is spilling over into neighboring countries.

The northern Iraqi region of Kurdistan - which already has its own government and armed forces - has also begun to pursue independent energy and foreign policies, which has infuriated the Shi’ite government of Nouri al-Maliki in Baghdad. Northern Iraq is the only area of the country which has seen peace and a semblance of stability since American troops left in 2011. Hmmm......Seems like in the end the Kurds will be the 'king makers'.Read the full story here.

Iraqi Kurd leader Massoud Barzani threatens secession unless power share demands met.

Iraqi Kurd leader Massoud Barzani threatens secession unless power share demands met.(AA).The president of Iraq’s semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region has demanded that officials agree to their demands or face consequences of a secession from Baghdad by September. In an exclusive interview with The Associated Press on Wednesday, the Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani demanded that the Shiite leaders agree on sharing power with their political opponents. “What threatens the unity of Iraq is dictatorship and authoritarian rule,” Barzani said in a 45-minute interview in his sprawling office outside of Irbil, the capital of the Kurdish region he leads in northern Iraq. “If Iraq heads toward a democratic state, then there will be no trouble. But if Iraq heads toward a dictatorial state, then we will not be able to live with dictatorship.” He called it a “very dangerous political crisis in the country” and said the impasse must be broken by September, when voters in the Kurdish region may consider a referendum for a state independent of Iraq. “They have to decide if they are willing to accept to live under a dictatorial regime or not,” he said. “They have to make that decision. It is their natural right.” Barzani’s warning speaks of fears about a Shiite domination in Iraq’s government and how it has revived secession dreams the United States military had tried to contain. The leader however, said that he is still committed to negotiating a compromise before promoting secession. He said he would hold on to it if the government logjam continues for much longer. He is the highest-ranking Iraqi official to disavow Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's government for sidelining its political opponents and, in some cases, persecuting them in what critics call an unabashed power grab.Hmmmm.......... The Kurds kingmakers.Read the full story here.

Oil rift deepens Baghdad-Kurds dispute.

Oil rift deepens Baghdad-Kurds dispute.(UPI).Tensions between Baghdad and Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish enclave have intensified after the Kurds halted oil exports in a payment dispute and the government signed a deal with BP to develop the Kirkuk oil fields the Kurds claim are theirs. “Oil is obviously at the forefront of every decision Baghdad makes and the fact that all of its hydrocarbons are located far from the capital is beginning to make the government’s position more precarious,” the Middle East Economic Digest observed recently.
Baghdad is increasingly alarmed at how the Kurdistan Regional Government, based in the northern city of Irbil, is attracting international oil companies to conduct exploration in the three Kurdish provinces along the northern borderlands. Baghdad refuses to recognize the deals the KRG has signed with 40 small foreign oil companies, insisting the government is the sole authority when it comes to oil contracts. But Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s government was severely jolted in October 2011 when the world’s largest oil company, Exxon Mobil of the United States, defied Baghdad and signed a six-block deal with Irbil. Baghdad declared that illegal. Tensions have risen since Exxon’s surprise move that jeopardized its stake in the huge West Qurna 1 field in the south. The company refuses to back down but so far it hasn’t begun drilling in Kurdistan. 
On March 25, the state-owned North Oil Co. announced it had signed a preliminary deal with BP to develop the northern Kirkuk oilfields, which contain one-third of Iraq’s reserves of 143.1 billion barrels. That was slap in the face for the KRG, which claims the city of Kirkuk and the oil fields are Kurdish territory because they formed a Kurdish province ruled by the Ottomans for 400 years. The BP deal, designed to boost Kirkuk production from 280,000 barrels per day to 580,000 bpd, was widely seen as Baghdad’s response to the KRG’s controversial contract with Exxon Mobil.
On Sunday, the KRG struck back by cutting back its oil exports, accusing Baghdad of failing to make payments totaling $1.5 billion since 2011. The KRG’s exports were reduced to 50,000 bpd from an estimated 90,000 bpd. Irbil threatened to cut off exports altogether within a month if Baghdad continued to withhold payment. Baghdad said it had allocated $560 million for the KRG but the dispute continues.
The rift has been magnified by the KRG giving sanctuary to Iraq’s fugitive vice president, Tareq al-Hashemi, and allowing him to flee to Qatar. Hashemi, the top Sunni politician in Maliki’s Shiite-dominated coalition, has been accused by the government of “aiding terrorists.” He denies the charges, which are widely seen as part of a widening crackdown by Maliki to eliminate his political rivals in the post-U.S. era. But it’s the feud over oil and revenue-sharing that dominates the widening rift between Baghdad and the Kurds. The outcome could have a far-reaching impact on Iraq’s future as it struggles to rebuild after decades of war, international sanctions and internal, sectarian rifts and on the minority Kurds’ determination to assert themselves as a long-suppressed people.
“Baghdad has an unenviable task of bringing together a country that has for so long been ripped apart by war and tyranny,” MEED observed. “Finding an effective and workable solution to selling its hydrocarbons should be its first priority.” The dispute centers primarily on Kirkuk, an ethnically mixed city where Saddam Hussein drove out the Kurds who once formed the majority and packed it with Arabs during his tyrannical rule. After the Americans toppled Saddam in April 2003, the Kurds, key U.S. allies during the invasion, reclaimed Kirkuk and its oil fields. Controlling them, along with reserves of an estimated 50 million barrels in Kurdistan, would form the economic backbone of the independent state for which the Kurds have fought for decades. The region has become a flashpoint between Iraq’s Arabs and the Kurds. U.S. forces kept the two sides apart but, now the Americans have left, the decades-old dispute between Kurds and Iraqi Arabs could ignite.
On top of that, Maliki’s dictatorial inclinations have prompted minority Sunni provinces to demand autonomy, threatening a possible breakup of the federal system established under the Americans. The Kurds are the effective kingmakers in Iraq’s often deadly politics and that gives the KRG in Irbil some high cards that Maliki ignores at his peril.Hmmmmm..........In mid-November, Barzani warned in an interview with Turkish television that the Iraqi Kurds would have no choice but to proclaim independence in the event of civil war.Obama: If We Work Hard, Afghanistan Could Be a Success...Like Iraq!
Read the full story here.

President of Iraqi Kurdistan Massoud Barazani : When We Declare Our Independence 'We Will Be Willing to Pay Any Price'

President of Iraqi Kurdistan Massoud Barazani: The Kurds Will Not Be a Party to Civil War in Iraq, But When We Declare Our Independence 'We Will Be Willing to Pay Any Price'The American Withdrawel might, God forbid make way for a civil war. Source : MemriTV.