Iraq Shiite militias rush to defend oil-rich Kirkuk from Islamic State
By Vivian Salama and Bram Janssen – Associated Press – Tuesday, February 17, 2015
KIRKUK, Iraq (AP) —
Shiite
prayers billow from a mosque loudspeaker at a sprawling Iraqi military
base on the fringes of the northern oil-rich city of Kirkuk as Shiite
militiamen, most of them in mismatched military fatigues, shuttle back
and forth to nearby front-lines, eager for a taste of victory against
the Islamic State group.
When the IS militants blitzed across northern and western Iraq last
year, tens of thousands of Shiite men answered a call-to-arms by the
country’s top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, to defend
the nation against the Sunni extremists.
Now the Shiite militiamen
have arrived in Kirkuk, long one of Iraq’s most hotly disputed
territories, and have made a string of bases just 10 kilometers (six
miles) from the city their home. A marriage of convenience has since
emerged with Iraq’s strained Kurdish forces, which had been exclusively
in charge of the city since last year when they repelled IS advances.
As they face a common enemy, the unexpected and often uncomfortable
alliance between the Kurdish and Shiite rivals is on display. The
friction is feeding the combustible inter-ethnic competition over who
will ultimately get control of the city.
The Shiite fighters,
officially known as the Popular Mobilization Forces, were instrumental
in helping the Iraqi military — which dissolved in the face of the
militants’ initial onslaught in northern Iraq — stall the IS push
outside Baghdad. They have also teamed up with Kurdish peshmerga
fighters in a number of battles, breaking the siege of the northern
Shiite-majority town of Amirli in August, and recently, driving Islamic
State militants out of a string of towns in Diyala province, northeast
of the Iraqi capital.
But their arrival in Kirkuk, 290 kilometers (180 miles) north of
Baghdad, has provoked deep-rooted sensitivities. Kurdish forces claimed
control of Kirkuk just days after the Islamic State group swept across
northern Iraq, seizing major cities, including Mosul and Tikrit. Kirkuk,
located along the fluid line that separates Kurdish northern Iraq from
the rest of the country, is home to Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen, and all
have competing claims to the area. The Kurds have long wanted to
incorporate the city into their semi-autonomous region, but Arabs and
Turkmen oppose this.
The Kurdish troops held their ground, but the IS attempted a
comeback. With what the Kurds say was assistance from a Sunni sleeper
cell in the city, Islamic State extremists stormed an abandoned Kirkuk
hotel last month, then staged a surprise attack on a Kurdish peshmerga
outpost, killing a top commander and several of his troops.
The apparently coordinated attack was a blow to the Kurds and
underscored their tenuous hold on the city, while the semi-autonomous
Kurdish government appealed for more weapons and training from the
U.S.-led coalition forces.
Since then, thousands of
fighters from a handful of militias such as the powerful Iran-backed
Badr Brigades, have flooded into Kirkuk and the surrounding Tamim
province.
Kirkuk Governor Najmaldin Karim welcomed the Shiite forces but
Massoud Barzani , the president of the Kurdish regional government,
insisted that the Shiite militiamen would be “prohibited under any
circumstances” from entering the city.
“We are already in Kirkuk,” Mullah Mohammed Yousseff, a Badr Brigades
spokesman, roared with laughter as he sat behind his desk inside a
trailer at the Taza Batallion base during a recent visit by The
Associated Press.
“We have to fight,” Yousseff added. “Our religion legitimizes it.”
The Badr Brigades commander, Hadi al-Amiri, came to Kirkuk last week
to deliver truckloads of weapons to Shiite fighters and vowed during a
meeting with senior Kurdish officials to send thousands more from his
militia to reinforce the area — much to the Kurds’ consternation. At
least 2,000 fighters have arrived at the Taza base alone since
al-Amiri’s visit.
Several militia commanders in Kirkuk estimate that as many as 5,000 Shiite fighters arrived in the region this month alone.
“I’m here because … al-Sistani called on us to protect our country,”
said 24-year-old Shiite fighter Amir al-Qassim, who came to Kirkuk from
his native Baghdad in January.
A former minister in the Kurdish regional government, Jafar Moustafa,
insisted that the reports of Shiite militia presence in Kirkuk are “far
from reality,” and that the governorate is firmly in the hands of the
Kurdish peshmerga forces.
But only a few kilometers
(miles) away from where Moustafa spoke to the AP, religious Shiite flags
mark the battlefield, while billboards with al-Amiri’s picture and that
of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr are hoisted alongside Shiite
outposts just south of the city.
“Run Daesh, run, by the orders of al-Sistani,” chanted a group of
Shiite fighters after a recent clash, firing their Kalashnikov rifles
into the air in celebration. Daesh is an Arabic acronym for the Islamic
State group.
Less than 50 meters (yards) away, Kurdish fighters stood guard along
the same front line. They did not engage with the Shiite militiamen and
refused to be interviewed.
Sunnis living in Kirkuk also have much at stake, and many are viewed
with suspicion, deemed guilty by association — simply for being Sunni
like the IS militants. The Shiite militias have been repeatedly accused
of severe brutality against Sunni communities as they push IS back.
A report released Sunday by Human Rights Watch accuses the Shiite
fighters of forcing Sunni residents from their homes, kidnappings, and
in some cases, executions.
Such sectarian fears hang over the streets of Kirkuk, and at the
outdoor bazaar in the heart of the city, many echoed concerns over the
Shiite militias’ brutal record.
“They act like gangsters and we are afraid of that,” said Yassin
Ahmed, 24, a Sunni resident of Kirkuk. “But the most important thing is
that they have to take care of the people and provide us with security.”
For many of the city’s Kurds, Kirkuk can only be Kurdish.
“Kirkuk is a Kurdish area,” said 48-year-old Ali Karim. “Only the peshmerga must be in control.”
Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/feb/17/iraq-shiite-militias-rush-defend-oil-rich-kirkuk-i/#ixzz3SAHQ5A8o
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