'Turkmen acting alone will not be enough to solve their problems,' the Iraqi Turkman
         Front deputy chairman says
 

    Nov 22, 2000
    Ankara - Turkish Daily News

    Palestinian refugees forced to leave their lands are being provided with accommodation in
    the Iraqi Turkman lands, Iraqi Turkman Front Deputy Chairman Mustafa Kemal Yaycili said
    yesterday, the Anatolia news agency reported.

    "The humanitarian needs of oppressed Palestinians are exploited in a manner to further
    the assimilation of Turkman community," he said in an address to the Second Turkman
    Convention continuing in Erbil, in northern Iraq.

    Yaycili claimed that the Iraqi administration had been using cruel methods to eradicate the
    national identity of the Kurdish and Turkman communities in northern Iraq, arguing that
    many Turkmen are still kept in Iraqi jails for no logical reason.

    He stated that Turkmen should act in unison to solve their problems but they should also
    cooperate with the region's other ethnic elements, since their acting alone would not be
    sufficient.

    In addition to the pressure from Iraq's Saddam Hussein administration, northern Iraq's
    Turkman community is also complaining of pressure imposed by the Iraqi Kurdistan
    Democratic Party (IKDP). The Iraqi administration's control over northern Iraq has been
    considerably reduced, due to a series of internationally-sanctioned measures on Iraq,
    including the establishment of a no-fly zone in the region.

    In related news, elections for the Iraqi Turkman Front are set for today, with Sanan Kasap
    as the leading contender for the chairman post.

    Speaking to journalists, Kasap said that both Turkmen and the Kurds of northern Iraq
    should cooperate and that the only solution to their current problems would be through
    dialogue.

    In response to a question about the reports of IKDP pressure on Turkmen, Kasap said,
    "Such things may happen, we should not exaggerate them," adding that a dialogue could
    solve such problems.
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The Kurdistan Observer
www.kurdistanobserver.com

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