There ain't nothing like putting ethnic minorities in the line of fire while trying to save their lives.
Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community arrive at the camp of Bajid
Kandala at Feeshkhabour near the Syria-Iraq border on Saturday. Photo: AP
August 10, 2014
By Liz Sly and Loveday Morris
...Makhmour (click here) was seized by fighters of the Islamic State in Iraq and Levant on Thursday.
Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community arrive at the camp of Bajid
Kandala at Feeshkhabour near the Syria-Iraq border on Saturday. Photo: APAugust 10, 2014
By Liz Sly and Loveday Morris
...Makhmour (click here) was seized by fighters of the Islamic State in Iraq and Levant on Thursday.
Earlier
thousands of desperate Iraqi Yazidis who have been trapped by Islamist
extremists on a parched mountaintop for almost a week, trekked into
Syrian territory controlled by Kurds, seeking refuge in another
war-ravaged country.
Shawkat Barbahari, an official from the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, put the number of people who escaped the siege and crossed back into Iraqi Kurdistan at 30,000....
Makhmour is refugee camp. It ain't Iraq no more. The ONLY ones that continue to all it that are the Europeans.
Turkey has a big stake in the protections of these people. The problem is, and I would caution Turkey a great deal, are the Kurds. See, this is the foothold for the new Kurdistan. I don't know what the new country will be named, yet, but, this is the beginning of a homeland. If the Kurds have their way their homeland will extend into Turkey. I caution them as well. I'd rather see the Kurds and Turks settle on peace and stability in the region before a border dispute that would achieve nothing.
The Kurds are also a minority ethnic group that have spent generations protecting their people and traditions. The Kurds are magnificent people who have caused no one problems in the region. If it weren't for the Kurds northern Iraq would be very unstable. Turkey needs to be grateful while offering help to protect this region.
August 10, 2014
8:18.39AM
The current chaos in Iraq (click here) may herald the safe return of thousands of Turkish citizens to their homeland, Deputy Prime Minister Beşir Atalay announced Aug. 8, saying that Ankara will implement an open door policy for those who have been living in the Makhmour camp for decades.
Atalay's comments as a Kurdish journalist was killed at the camp while reporting about the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant's (ISIL) attack on the area.
“There are new developments in Iraq. We have received information that as of yesterday [Aug. 7], the Makhmour camp has been evacuated. There are people who want to go to Turkey from there. Most of them are our citizens anyway. They had gone from neighborhood of Hakkari; they had gone from villages and towns like Çukurca and Uludere due to the deteriorating conditions,” Atalay told reporters during a visit to the southeastern Anatolian border province of Hakkari. “Our door will be open if they come back. They will enter from our borders,” Atalay added....
...Yet, the Kurdish population in the Makhmour camp who are Turkish citizens have a complicated situation, since some of them are subject to lawsuits regarding the PKK, while there is a generation born in the camp who do not hold Turkish passport. As a matter of fact, up until the last few years, Turkey had long pressed for the closure of the Makhmour camp, claiming that it was under the PKK’s control and served as a supply base of fresh militants who would join the organization.
However, in recent years, the government has initiated a peace process, aimed at ending the three-decade-long conflict between Turkey’s security forces and the PKK....
Shawkat Barbahari, an official from the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, put the number of people who escaped the siege and crossed back into Iraqi Kurdistan at 30,000....
Makhmour is refugee camp. It ain't Iraq no more. The ONLY ones that continue to all it that are the Europeans.
Turkey has a big stake in the protections of these people. The problem is, and I would caution Turkey a great deal, are the Kurds. See, this is the foothold for the new Kurdistan. I don't know what the new country will be named, yet, but, this is the beginning of a homeland. If the Kurds have their way their homeland will extend into Turkey. I caution them as well. I'd rather see the Kurds and Turks settle on peace and stability in the region before a border dispute that would achieve nothing.
The Kurds are also a minority ethnic group that have spent generations protecting their people and traditions. The Kurds are magnificent people who have caused no one problems in the region. If it weren't for the Kurds northern Iraq would be very unstable. Turkey needs to be grateful while offering help to protect this region.
August 10, 2014
8:18.39AM
The current chaos in Iraq (click here) may herald the safe return of thousands of Turkish citizens to their homeland, Deputy Prime Minister Beşir Atalay announced Aug. 8, saying that Ankara will implement an open door policy for those who have been living in the Makhmour camp for decades.
Atalay's comments as a Kurdish journalist was killed at the camp while reporting about the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant's (ISIL) attack on the area.
“There are new developments in Iraq. We have received information that as of yesterday [Aug. 7], the Makhmour camp has been evacuated. There are people who want to go to Turkey from there. Most of them are our citizens anyway. They had gone from neighborhood of Hakkari; they had gone from villages and towns like Çukurca and Uludere due to the deteriorating conditions,” Atalay told reporters during a visit to the southeastern Anatolian border province of Hakkari. “Our door will be open if they come back. They will enter from our borders,” Atalay added....
...Yet, the Kurdish population in the Makhmour camp who are Turkish citizens have a complicated situation, since some of them are subject to lawsuits regarding the PKK, while there is a generation born in the camp who do not hold Turkish passport. As a matter of fact, up until the last few years, Turkey had long pressed for the closure of the Makhmour camp, claiming that it was under the PKK’s control and served as a supply base of fresh militants who would join the organization.
However, in recent years, the government has initiated a peace process, aimed at ending the three-decade-long conflict between Turkey’s security forces and the PKK....
