Border Conflicts Testing Kurdish Tightrope Act in Iraq

The Iraqi Kurdish administration is running out of options as it faces growing pressure to end the fighting between its neighbors and Kurdish rebels based inside its borders.

But analysts say a breakthrough in the decades-old conflicts is impossible without closer American engagement.

Iraqi Kurdish leaders have postponed plans for a conference, due to have been held this spring, where many had hoped the rebels would be urged to lay down their arms.

Meanwhile, tension has been mounting in Iraq’s remote, mountainous north, with Turkey and Iran directing air raids and artillery fire across the border at what they say are Kurdish rebel bases.

Analysts say the Kurdistan Regional Government, KRG, must take a more active role in ending the conflicts being played out on its territory.

Henri Barkey, author of a recent report on the region for a Washington-based think-tank the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told IWPR the KRG could seek to persuade the rebels to agree to some form of deal “and ensure that a demilitarization is done honorably”.

Fuad Husayn, the chief of staff for the Kurdistan region’s president, Massoud Barzani, said the KRG wanted “good relations with its neighbors” and rejected the activities of “any force which uses the region’s soil” to attack them.

He told IWPR the KRG believed dialogue was the only way to secure peace. “Such issues cannot be solved through military actions from any side,” he said. However, he said, the KRG had not held any discussions with the rebel Kurdish Workers’ Party, PKK, on ending the fighting.

Unlike the KRG, the United States endorses military action as part of a broader solution to the conflict. A U.S. embassy official in Ankara told IWPR Washington’s strategy to end the fighting included supporting Turkey “with intelligence sharing and other operations.”

The U.S. stepped up its engagement in the region in 2007 by classifying the PKK as a terrorist organization – a move which effectively bars the group from any potential U.S.-backed peace talks.

“The PKK has conducted more than enough violent acts to justify being labeled a terrorist organization,” said the U.S. official, when asked whether the move to proscribe the group may have weakened prospects for an eventual settlement by affirming Turkey’s military strategy.

The U.S. official stressed that military operations alone would not solve the conflict. She said leaders in the region were working towards “a comprehensive solution that includes other aspects of the Kurdish issue,” such as economic and social development.

But Barkey says the U.S. “has not been as energetic as it could have been” in pursuing a resolution of the conflict.

As a partner to Turkey within the NATO alliance and a vocal supporter of its bid to join the EU, Washington has great influence over Ankara’s political leadership and its powerful military.

The U.S. also holds sway with the KRG, which is looking to Washington to safeguard Iraq’s federal system amid fears that Baghdad is trying to curb the Kurds’ extensive autonomy.

Recent events suggest the Iraqi Kurdish leadership cannot revive the peace process without American help, say analysts.

Turkish air force jets this month bombed what they said were bases used by the PKK in northern Iraq, reportedly killing ten rebel fighters.

Iran too stepped up its attacks on the PKK’s smaller offshoot, the Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan, PJAK, by firing artillery shells and sending attack helicopters across the border into Iraq.

The attacks on the ground were accompanied by diplomatic pressure on the KRG to crack down on the rebels.