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Iraqi Kurds Fear a Resurgent Baghdad

Arab-Kurdish tensions intensify as country's safety improves

By Wesley Oliver, Newser Staff

Posted Feb 20, 2009 1:45 AM CST

(Newser) – Now that violence between Sunni and Shia Arabs is declining across Iraq, tensions are mounting again between Arabs and Kurds, who want Barack Obama to step in to cool off conflicts, the Economist reports. Oil and land disputes, political losses and an empowered central government have weakened the Kurds, who complain of Arab bullying. One official called Iraqi President Nouri al-Maliki “a second Saddam.”

Maliki has been consolidating his power, recently deploying Iraqi troops to disputed regions. The prime minister of the autonomous Kurdistan region is urging Obama to appoint a special envoy to mediate the conflict. “We love them, but they don’t care,” he said of US officials. Washington will likely “kick the issue down the road," said an American general.

[Images (6)]

[Quotes (1)]

Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani speaks with the news media in Irbil, 217 miles north of Baghdad in 2007. (AP Photo/Yahya Ahmed)

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Kurdistan Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani once had cordial relations, but their relationship has soured and they haven't spoken in months. (AP Photo/Iraqi Government)

An elderly Iraqi Kurdish man walks in Dahuk bazaar in Dauhk city, situated close to the Iraqi/Turkish border about 300 miles northwest of Baghdad. (Getty Images)

With American approval, Nouri al-Maliki has consolidated his power. He has called for a strong central government, anathema to the Kurds after their suffering at the hands of Saddam Hussein. (AP Photo/Alaa al-Marjani)

Khalil Mobreh Ahmed in Beagova village, near the Turkish border, some 300 miles northwest of Baghdad. (AP Photo/ Khalid Mohammed)

Iraqi Kurds attend prayers at a mosque in Dahuk, 260 miles northwest of Baghdad. (AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed)

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We love them but they don’t care. When we say something about protecting our people’s rights, they see it as a problem that disrupts their Iraq policy. - Nechirvan Barzani, prime minister of Iraq's Kurdistan region, on American officials

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Iraqi Kurds Fear a Resurgent Baghdad