The Kurds' desire to secure and consolidate the freedoms they enjoyed in the decade prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq has reshaped U.S.-Kurdish relations in many ways. In order to keep Iraq united with a strong central government, U.S. policy tries to ensure that the Kurds do not seek independence. At the same time, though, The United States has tried to work with the Kurdish Regional Government. The Kurds have equally tried to support the U.S. presence in Iraq as they too benefit from the cooperative relationship.
June 30, 2007 | By Omar SINAN, Associated Press Writer
MOUNT AZMAR, Iraq -- Maher Talaat and his two friends sat on the grassy mountainside, toasting bottles of beer and gazing at the pastoral scene -- and at the girls.
"Japanese authorities have detained a Turkish Kurd recognized as a refugee by the United Nations, saying a Tokyo court overruled his petition to block deportation, officials said Tuesday. The unidentified man was taken into custody by the Tokyo Immigration Bureau on Monday, bureau spokesman Shoichiro Okabe said. The move follows the forced expulsion last month of two Turkish Kurds also recognized as refugees by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.
Tue May 8, 2007
Iraqi Kurd leader Massud Barzani denied that he threatened to intervene in Turkey over the Kurdish minority question, while warning Ankara he would not tolerate any threats from them.
Reuters - Monday, March 27, 2006; A12
IRBIL, Iraq, March 26 -- An Iraqi-born Kurd with Austrian citizenship was sentenced to a year and a half in prison Sunday for defaming a Kurdish leader, in a case that has raised questions about press freedoms in postwar Iraq.
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN - Published: April 26, 2006
ANKARA, Turkey, April 25 - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice assured Turkish leaders on Tuesday that the United States would step up efforts to stop Kurdish insurgents in Iraq from infiltrating into Turkey, but she cautioned the government not to send troops to Iraq to do the job.
September 10, 2007 | By Chip Cummins
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- Hunt Oil Co. has struck a deal to explore for oil in Iraq's semiautonomous Kurdish region, signaling a new willingness by some large Western companies to bypass the fractious government in Baghdad and deal directly with regional authorities in the war-torn country.
February, 14th 2008 | ISTANBUL
What lies behind the row over lifting the headscarf ban in universities
TO TURKEY'S secular elite it is a step back to the dark ages; to its conservatives, an overdue right. Either way, the constitutional changes approved by parliament to ease the ban on the wearing of the Muslim headscarf in universities will trigger a new battle between the mildly Islamist prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and his secular opponents.
March 24, 2008
ANKARA, Turkey —" Police broke up a protest Monday by hundreds of demonstrators in a fifth straight day of clashes with Kurds in southeastern Turkey.
WASHINGTON The last time American diplomats locked a group of prospective founding fathers in a room with orders not to come out until they had a constitution was a decade ago, in Dayton, Ohio. The founding fathers in question represented Bosnia's Muslim, Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christian communities.
