1.
Kosrat Rasul Ali
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Kosrat Rasul Ali is a Kurdish politician, acting Secretary General of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, veteran Peshmerga military leader and vice president of the Kurdistan Region. He was born in 1952 as Abdulla Rasul in the village of Shiwashok near the city of Koya which is in the province of Erbil. His father was Rasul Ali, who worked for the oil company near the village, the family was well known in the area. At the end of 1975, he joined Komala and took over supervision of student activities and he founded the Kurdistan Students Group in Kirkuk with a number of his colleagues in 1976. Kosrat was arrested in 1977 by Baath Party security services in Kirkuk for organizing political activities, after his release from prison, he rejoined Peshmerga fighters. In 1981, Kosrat became a member of the Komala party. Kosrat assumed leadership roles in the PUK, taking control in 1984-5 of the partys Third, in Hawler the people had attempted to liberate the city but were unsuccessful. Alongside the Pesharmga the people of Hawler managed to liberate the city on 11 March, under the leadership of Kosrat, Kurdish forces launched a large-scale military operation to further push back ISIS and eliminate threats on the city of Kirkuk and its oilfields. He states what has been conquered with Kurdish blood shall remain Kurdish soil, in 1992 elected as Member of Kurdistan Parliament Kosrat held the post of prime minister from 1993 to 2001, in the second cabinet and third cabinet. He was succeeded by Barham Salih in 2001, the U. S. state department in a Wikileaks cable describes his tenure as Prime Minister as largely well regarded as a populist leader. Kosrat has held the post of Vice President twice 2005 to 2009 and 2009 to present, as vice president he is deputy commander in chief of the Peshmerga. In retaliation for his role as leader of the Peshmerga in the Erbil province, kosrats second son Darbaz is Minister of Housing and Reconstruction in the eighth cabinet of the Kurdistan Regional Government. Kosrat was seriously injured in fighting in 1985, and continues to suffer from wounds to his neck
2.
Nawshirwan Mustafa
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Nawshirwan Mustafa is the General Coordinator of the Movement for Change and the leader of the official opposition in the Kurdistan Region. Nawshirwan Mustafa was born in the old quarter of Sulaymaniyah, Iraq 1944, Mustafas grandfather Émin Khider was a financier of the Kingdom of Kurdistan and its government according to the newspaper Pêşkewtin. Nawshirwan whose name means the soul, was named by his father after the twentieth Sassanid Emperor Khusro I Anōšīravān. Silemani has been the seat of the Mustafa family since the city was founded in 1784, unlike Kurdistans other prominent political leaders Masoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani, Mustafa hails from a city not a village and is not a member of a tribe. Mustafa joined the KDP in 1960 where he was active in the youth branch. He allied himself with Barzanis opponents in the politburo and resigned from the party before the KDP split, Mustafa attended the Royal King Faisal school at Silemani and was also taught foreign languages by private tutors at an early age. He went on to political science at Baghdad University. In 1970, Mustafa was sentenced to death by the Revolutionary Court in Baghdad, as a result, he went into exile in Austria, where he studied international law at Vienna University. Furthermore, he speaks German, English, Arabic and Persian, the PUK was founded in June 1975 by combining Mustafas Komala with the Socialist Movement of Kurdistan, headed by Ali Askari, under the general leadership of Jalal Talabani. The most influential of these groups was Komala, during the late 1970s through the 80s and the early 90s Mustafa was the commander in chief of Peshmerga forces, conducting a guerrilla war against the Iraqi Baathist army and government. After inflicting serious damage on the better equipped Iraqi army, the Baathist government turned to chemical warfare, in 1988 Mustafa, with Talabani and the leadership of PUK, decided to initiate a tactical retreat to the Iranian border in the hope that Saddam would end the Anfal Campaign. In the spring of 1991, Mustafa, initiated his plan, Mustafa oversaw and conducted the operation, which resulted in the liberation of all the major cities, ending with the liberation of Kirkuk on 21 March 1991. Mustafa is known as the architect of the uprising because he oversaw the liberation of Kurdistan of Iraq for the first time since the creation of the state of Iraq and this subsequent autonomy has led to the current Kurdistan Regional government which is an autonomous region in Northern Iraq. In July 2000 Patriotic Union of Kurdistan attacked the bases of Worker-communist Party, during the attacks five were killed and some injured, also hundreds of party members were arrested. In 2011 Worker-communist Party of Kurdistan filed a lawsuit against Nawshirwan Mustafa, Mustafa was the head of the main opposition list, Change List, in the Iraqi Kurdistan legislative election,2009. The Change List is a coalition which consists of independents, members of the PUK and KDP. The Change List won the support of more than 51% of the As Sulaymaniyah Governorate voters, the Change list participated in the Iraqi parliamentary election,2010 and won eight seats in both the As Sulaymaniyah and Arbil Governorates. Jalal Talabani in November 2011 sent a delegation to seek reconciliation with Mustafa, the delegation was told that “Talabani should reconcile with the People, not with Gorran” and that “we do not have any personal issue with Talabani”
3.
Fuad Masum
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Muhammad Fuad Masum is the seventh and current President of Iraq, in office since 24 July 2014. He is a veteran Iraqi Kurdish politician and was elected as President following the 2014 parliamentary election, Masum is the second non-Arab president of Iraq, succeeding Jalal Talabani, also Kurdish, and is a confidant of Talabani. Fuad Masum was born in the city of Koya and his family descends from the village of Khabanen, which is part of Hawraman. He studied at religious schools in Iraqi Kurdistan until the age of 18. He studied law and Sharia at Baghdad University, in 1958, Masum traveled to Cairo to complete his higher education at Al-Azhar University. He worked as a professor in Basrah University in 1968 and he earned his PhD in Islamic philosophy from Al-Azhar in 1975. Masum joined the Iraqi Communist Party in 1962, until 1964, after Masum discovered Bakdashs attitudes against the Kurds, he quit the party to join the Kurdistan Democratic Party. In 1968, Masum was the PDK representative in Basra and he was also the representative of the Kurdish Revolution in Cairo until 1975. Masum was one of the founders of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan in 1976, by 1992, he was the first prime minister of Kurdistan. In 2003, following the invasion of Iraq, Masum returned to Baghdad to be a member of the delegation representing Kurdistan, in 2010, Masum became the first Speaker of the Council of Representatives. In 2014, he was elected by the parliament representatives as the president of Iraq. Masum won 211 votes while his closest competitor, Barham Salih, the decision was made during a secret vote of Kurdish MPs, who traditionally have control over the presidency for the sake of political balance. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was present in Iraq when the decision was made, Masum accepted the position, noting the huge security, political and economic tasks he faces as president. On 26 August, Masum appointed a new minister, Haider al-Abadi. Masums appointment of Haider al-Abadi as new minister was considered illegal by Nouri al-Maliki. Maliki said that in spite of his erosion of power it was his duty to remain in power because the appointment was a conspiracy rooted from outside of Iraq. Al-Maliki referred the matter to the federal court claiming, the insistence on this until the end is to protect the state, Masum is married to Rounak Abdulwahid Mustafa and has five daughters, Shereen, Juwan, Zozan, Shilan and Veian. He had a son, Showan, who died from a childhood illness, can Iraqs new president save country from fragmenting
4.
Kurdistan Democratic Party
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The Kurdistan Democratic Party, usually abbreviated as KDP or PDK, is one of the main Kurdish parties in Iraqi Kurdistan. It was founded in 1946 in Mahabad in Iranian Kurdistan, the KDP has been described as being controlled by Barzani tribe. In 1946, the leader of the Soviet-backed Republic of Mahabad, Qazi Muhammad, announced the formation of a Kurdish Democratic Party based in Iran, or Eastern Kurdistan. The Soviet Union, then supporting the Kurdish national struggle against the monarchies of Iran and Iraq and it was well-known in nationalist circles that the relations between the two men were not easy. Barzani attempted to create a special dispensation for the Barzanis in Iran, but Qazi rebuffed them stating There is to be one party. In the meantime, Barzani was negotiating with Baghdad to allow his return to Iraq, the new KDP of Iraq held its first congress in Baghdad on August 16,1946. The 32 delegates elected a committee with Hamza Abd Allah as secretary-general, Shaykh Latif and Kaka Ziyad Agha as vice-presidents. The party demanded autonomy for Iraqi Kurdistan, stating that the political, the party programme was not specific about any social or economic content for fear of alienating the highly conservative tribal chiefs and landlords who had agreed to support it. After the collapse of the Mahabad republic in early 1947, Ibrahim Ahmad, previously the Sulaymaniyah representative of the Iranian KDP, joined the Iraqi KDP. Throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, the KDP and the Kurdish members of the Iraqi Communist Party steadily increased their working relationship – in many cases fielding joint candidates. By 1954 the KDP was advocating the replacement of the Iraqi monarchy with a democratic republic – much to the consternation of many of their tribal supporters. On July 14,1958, Brigadier Abd al-Karim Qasim and his fellow Free Officers staged a coup that promised a brighter future for the Kurds of Iraq. Although the KDP and ICP were excluded from the new United National Front government, Qasim formed a three-man Sovereignty Council of a Sunni, a Shii, and a Kurd. The KDP immediately pledged its support for the new regime, in its newspaper hailing a new era of freedom and equality for the Kurdish, Ibrahim Ahmad attempted to pressure Qasim into including Kurdish autonomy in the Provisional Constitution. However, Qasim was under greater pressure from his deputy Abdul Salam Arif. They objected to Qasims apparently pro-Kurdish attitude and his friendliness towards Mustafa Barzani in particular, Qasim had officially named him Chairman of the KDP, gave him one of Nuri as-Saids old residences in Baghdad, an automobile, and a handsome monthly stipend. While the Communists and Kurds settled scores, Qasim used the revolt as a pretext to purge Nationalists and Baathists from the Iraqi armed forces and government. Qasim used an almost identical event that July, but this time in Kirkuk, as a pretext to act against the KDPs closest allies, the Communists
5.
Iraqi Kurdistan
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Iraqi Kurdistan, officially called the Kurdistan Region by the Iraqi constitution, is located in the north of Iraq and constitutes the countrys only autonomous region. The region is governed by the Kurdistan Regional Government, with the capital being Erbil. Kurdistan is a democracy with its own regional Parliament that consists of 111 seats. Masoud Barzani, who was elected as president in 2005, was re-elected in 2009. In August 2013 the parliament extended his presidency for two years. His presidency concluded on 19 August 2015 after the parties failed to reach an agreement over extending his term. The new Constitution of Iraq defines the Kurdistan Region as an entity of Iraq. The four governorates of Duhok, Hawler, Silemani, and Halabja comprise around 41,710 square kilometres and have a population of 5.5 million. In 2014, during the 2014 Iraq Crisis, Iraqi Kurdistans forces also took much of the disputed territories of Northern Iraq. The establishment of the Kurdistan Region dates back to the March 1970 autonomy agreement between the Kurdish opposition and the Iraqi government after years of heavy fighting, further, the 1980–88 Iran–Iraq War, especially the Iraqi Armys Al-Anfal Campaign, devastated the population and environment of Iraqi Kurdistan. As Kurds continued to fight government troops, Iraqi forces finally left Kurdistan in October 1991, in 1992, the major political parties in the region, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, established the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government. The 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequent political changes led to the ratification of a new constitution in 2005, the name Kurdistan literally means Land of the Kurds. The suffix -stan is Iranian for place of or country, in English translations of the Constitution of Iraq, it is called Kurdistan, four times in the phrase region of Kurdistan and once in the phrase Kurdistan region. The regional government calls it the Kurdistan Region, the full name of the government is the Kurdistan Regional Government, abbreviated KRG. Kurds also refer to the region as Başûrê Kurdistanê or Başûrî Kurdistan, during the Baath Party administration in the 1970s and 1980s, the region was called the Kurdish Autonomous Region. The Kurdistan Region is largely mountainous, with the highest point being a 3,611 m point known locally as Cheekha Dar, the mountains are part of the larger Zagros mountain range which also extends into Iran. There are many rivers running through the region, which is distinguished by its fertile lands, plentiful water, the Great Zab and the Little Zab flow from the east to the west in the region. The Tigris river enters Iraqi Kurdistan from Turkish Kurdistan, the mountainous nature of Iraqi Kurdistan, the difference of temperatures in its various parts, and its wealth of waters make it a land of agriculture and tourism
6.
Kurdish nationalism
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These territories lie in northern Iraq, northwestern Iran, eastern and southeastern Turkey, and northern Syria. Early Kurdish nationalism had its roots in the days of the Ottoman Empire, Kurdish nationalist movements have long been suppressed by Turkey, Iran and the Arab-majority states of Iraq and Syria, all of whom fear loss of territory to a potential independent Kurdistan. Since the 1970s, Iraqi Kurds have pursued the goal of greater autonomy and even outright independence against the Baath Party regimes, since the 1980s, the Kurdish-Turkish conflict led by Kurdish armed groups challenged the Turkish state, which responded with martial law. After the 2003 invasion of Iraq that ousted dictator Saddam Hussein, Iraqi Kurdistan became a region, enjoying a great measure of self-governance. Kurdish nationalism has long been espoused and promoted by the worldwide Kurdish diaspora, the Kurdish nationalist struggle first emerged in the late 19th century when a unified movement demanded the establishment of a Kurdish state. In 1880, Ubeydullah, demanded political autonomy or outright independence for Kurds, the uprising against Qajar Persia and the Ottoman Empire was ultimately suppressed by the Ottomans and Ubeydullah, along with other notables, were exiled to Istanbul. Western powers fighting the Turks also promised the Kurds they would act as guarantors for Kurdish freedom, one particular organization, the Kürdistan Teali Cemiyeti was central to the forging of a distinct Kurdish identity. While these researchers had ulterior political motives their findings were embraced, under the millet system, Kurds primary form of identification was religious with Sunni Islam being the top in the hierarchy. While the Ottoman Empire embarked on a modernization and centralization campaign known as the Tanzimat, Kurdish regions retained much of their autonomy, the Sublime Porte made little attempt to alter the traditional power structure of segmented, agrarian Kurdish societies – agha, sheikh, and tribal chief. This bolstered the Kurds authority and autonomy, for instance, the Ottoman qadi, in 1908, the Young Turks come to power asserting a radical form of Turkish ethnic identity and closed Ottoman associations and non-Turkish schools. At the end of World War I, Kurds still had the right to conduct their affairs in Kurdish, celebrate unique traditions. The once politically unified Ottoman Kurdistan was then divided into the different administrative and political systems in Iraq, Turkey, equal citizenship rights were enshrined in Turkeys 1920 Provisional Constitution. Article 8 asserted that the country was composed of both Turks and Kurds but under the law they would be treated as common citizens, however, the 1923 formation of the Republic of Turkey marked the beginning of continuing period of reduced civic rights for Kurds. The Caliphate was abolished a year later as well as all public expressions and institutions of Kurdish identity, Kurdish madrassas, newspapers, religious fraternal organizations, and associations were shut down. Kurdish regions were placed under martial law and the use of the Kurdish language, dress, folklore and it was this continued repression that led to reemergence of Kurdish nationalism in the 1960s and 1970s. During this period the primary goal of the movement was to resolve its grievances with the Turkish government through legitimate channels, civic rights were temporarily improved with the Turkish Constitution of 1961 which allowed freedom of expression, the press, and association for Kurds. The 1964 Political Parties Act criminalized Kurdish political parties and the acknowledgment of the existence of different languages and races in Turkey, the 1972 Law of Association further restricted rights to association and political organization. The failure to address the Kurdish grievances throughout the 1960s and 1970s led to alternate avenues of resolution, in 1984 the Kurdistan Workers Party started a guerrilla insurgency against the Turkish Republic
7.
Social democracy
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In this period, social democrats embraced a mixed economy based on the predominance of private property, with only a minority of essential utilities and public services under public ownership. By 1868–1869, Marxism had become the official theoretical basis of the first social democratic party established in Europe, in this period, social democracy became associated with reformist socialism. The origins of social democracy have been traced to the 1860s, with the rise of the first major party in Europe. 1864 saw the founding of the International Workingmens Association, also known as the First International, another issue in the First International was the role of reformism. Although Lassalle was not a Marxist, he was influenced by the theories of Marx and Engels, however unlike Marxs and Engelss The Communist Manifesto, Lassalle promoted class struggle in a more moderate form. While Marx viewed the state negatively as an instrument of class rule that should only exist temporarily upon the rise to power of the proletariat and then dismantled, Lassalle accepted the state. Lassalle viewed the state as a means through which workers could enhance their interests, Lassalles strategy was primarily electoral and reformist, with Lassalleans contending that the working class needed a political party that fought above all for universal adult male suffrage. The ADAVs party newspaper was called Der Sozialdemokrat, Marx and Engels responded to the title Sozialdemocrat with distaste, Engels once writing, But what a title, Sozialdemokrat. Why dont they simply call it The Proletarian. Marx agreed with Engels that Sozialdemokrat was a bad title, there was a Marxist faction within the ADAV represented by Wilhelm Liebknecht who became one of the editors of the Die Sozialdemokrat. Friction in the ADAV arose over Lassalles policy of an approach to Bismarck that had assumed incorrectly that Bismarck in turn would be friendly towards them. This approach was opposed by the partys Marxists, including Liebknecht, opposition in the ADAV to Lassalles friendly approach to Bismarcks government resulted in Liebknecht resigning from his position as editor of Die Sozialdemokrat and leaving the ADAV in 1865. Though the SDAP was not officially Marxist, it was the first major organization to be led by Marxists and Marx. The party adopted stances similar to those adopted by Marx at the First International, there was intense rivalry and antagonism between the SDAP and the ADAV, with the SDAP being highly hostile to the Prussian government while the ADAV pursued a reformist and more cooperative approach. In spite of such militant rhetoric to appeal to the working class, in 1875 Marx attacked the Gotha Program that became the program of Social Democratic Party of Germany in the same year in his Critique of the Gotha Program. Marx was not optimistic that Germany at the time was not open to a means to achieve socialism. In addition he noticed a change over the relations between the two classes. The Reform Acts of 1867 and 1884 make an approach to universal suffrage. The Fabian Society was founded as a group from the Fellowship of the New Life due to opposition within that group to socialism
8.
Political spectrum
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A political spectrum is a system of classifying different political positions upon one or more geometric axes that symbolize independent political dimensions. Most long-standing spectra include a wing and left wing, which originally referred to seating arrangements in the French parliament after the Revolution. According to the simplest left–right axis, communism and socialism are usually regarded internationally as being on the left, liberalism can mean different things in different contexts, sometimes on the left, sometimes on the right. Those with an intermediate outlook are classified as centrists or moderates, politics that rejects the conventional left–right spectrum is known as syncretic politics. Political scientists have noted that a single left–right axis is insufficient for describing the existing variation in political beliefs. As seen from the Speakers seat at the front of the Assembly, the aristocracy sat on the right, originally, the defining point on the ideological spectrum was the Ancien Régime. The Right thus implied support for aristocratic or royal interests, and the church, while The Left implied support for republicanism, secularism, and civil liberties. Because the political franchise at the start of the revolution was relatively narrow, the original Left represented mainly the interests of the bourgeoisie and their political interests in the French Revolution lay with opposition to the aristocracy, and so they found themselves allied with the early capitalists. However, this did not mean that their interests lay with the laissez-faire policies of those representing them politically. As capitalist economies developed, the aristocracy became less relevant and were replaced by capitalist representatives. This evolution has often pulled parliamentary politicians away from laissez-faire economic policies, for almost a century, social scientists have considered the problem of how best to describe political variation. In 1950, Leonard W. Submitting the results to factor analysis and this system was derived empirically, rather than devising a political model on purely theoretical grounds and testing it, Fergusons research was exploratory. As a result of method, care must be taken in the interpretation of Fergusons three factors, as factor analysis will output an abstract factor whether an objectively real factor exists or not. Although replication of the Nationalism factor was inconsistent, the finding of Religionism and Humanitarianism had a number of replications by Ferguson, shortly afterward, Hans Eysenck began researching political attitudes in Great Britain. He believed that there was something similar about the National Socialists on the one hand. Submitting this value questionnaire to the process of factor analysis used by Ferguson. Such analysis produces a factor whether or not it corresponds to a real-world phenomenon, Eysencks dimensions of R and T were found by factor analyses of values in Germany and Sweden, France, and Japan. According to Eysenck, members of both ideologies were tough-minded, in this context, Eysenck carried out studies on nazism and communist groups, claiming to find members of both groups to be more dominant and more aggressive than control groups
9.
Socialist International
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The Socialist International is a worldwide association of political parties, most of which seek to establish democratic socialism. It consists mostly of democratic socialist, social-democratic and labour political parties, although formed in 1951 as a successor to the Labour and Socialist International, it has antecedents to the late nineteenth century. Initially dominated by parties from Western Europe, it has grown to include 153 member parties from over 100 countries and its members have governed in many countries including most of Europe. The Party of European Socialists, a major European political party, is an organisation of the SI. The current secretary general of the SI is Luis Ayala, who has held the post since 1989, the current president of the SI is the former Prime Minister of Greece George Papandreou. The International Workingmens Association was the first international body to bring together organisations representing the working class and it was formed in London on 28 September 1864 by socialist, communist and anarchist political groups and trade unions. Tensions between moderates and revolutionaries led to its dissolution in 1876 in Philadelphia, the Second International was formed in Paris on 14 July 1889 as an association of the socialist parties. Differences over World War I led to the Second International being dissolved in 1916, International Socialist Commission was formed in February 1919 at a meeting in Berne by parties that wanted to resurrect the Second International. In March 1919 communist parties formed Comintern at a meeting in Moscow, Parties which did not want to be a part of the resurrected Second International or Comintern formed the International Working Union of Socialist Parties on 27 February 1921 at a conference in Vienna. The ISC and the IWUSP joined to form the Labour and Socialist International in May 1923 at a meeting in Hamburg, the rise of Nazism and the start of World War II led to the dissolution of the LSI in 1940. The Socialist International was formed in Frankfurt in July 1951 as a successor to the LSI, during the post-World War II period, the SI aided social democratic parties in re-establishing themselves when dictatorship gave way to democracy in Portugal and Spain. Until its 1976 Geneva Congress, the SI had few members outside Europe, in the 1980s, most SI parties gave their backing to the Nicaraguan Sandinistas, whose left-wing government had incited enmity from the United States. The SI supported détente and disarmament agreements, such as SALTII, START and they had several meetings and discussion in Washington, D. C. with President Jimmy Carter and Vice-President George Bush and in Moscow with Secretaries General Leonid Brezhnev and Mikhail Gorbachev. The SIs delegations to these discussions were led by the Finnish Prime Minister Kalevi Sorsa, following the Tunisian revolution, the Constitutional Democratic Rally was expelled from the SI in January 2011. Later that month, the Egyptian National Democratic Party was also expelled, as a result of the 2010–2011 Ivorian crisis, the Ivorian Popular Front was expelled in March 2011. However, according to section 5.1.3 of the statutes of the Socialist International, Social Democracy and Southern Africa by Vladimir Shubin,1989. Julius Braunthal, The Rebirth of Social Democracy, Foreign Affairs, in JSTOR Pentti Vaananen, The Rose and the Fist, SYS Print,2014, pp. 50–230
10.
Progressive Alliance
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The Progressive Alliance is an international alliance of social-democratic and progressive political parties and organisations founded on 22 May 2013 in Leipzig, Germany. Progressive Alliance comprises 140 members from around the world, gabriel had been critical of the Socialist Internationals admittance and continuing inclusion of undemocratic political movements into the organization. An initial Conference of the Progressive Alliance was held in Rome, Italy on 14–15 December 2012, also present were representatives of the Indian National Congress, the Workers Party of Brazil, and PASOK of Greece. The Dutch Labour Party also supported the formation of the organization, as did the Swiss Socialist Party, the organization stated the aim of becoming the global network of the progressive, democratic, social-democratic, socialist and labour movement. It was reported that representatives of approximately 70 social-democratic political parties from across the world attended the event, the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats group in the European Parliament joined the organization upon its official foundation. Many member parties are affiliated to the Socialist International. On 4–5 December 2014, a Progressive Alliance conference was held in Lisbon for member parties of the S&D group, on 25 April 2016 the organisation held a seminar in São Paulo hosted by the Workers Party of Brazil. The Progressive Alliance lists the parties and organisations which participate in the network, rather than claiming members
11.
Spring green
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Spring green is a color included on the color wheel that is precisely halfway between cyan and green. When plotted on the CIE chromaticity diagram it corresponds to a stimulus of 505 nanometers on the visible spectrum. Spring green is a pure chroma on the color wheel, in HSV color space, the expression of which is known as the RGB color wheel, spring green has a hue of 150°. Spring green is one of the colors on the RGB color wheel. The complementary color of spring green is rose, displayed at right is the color spring green. Spring green is a web color, the first recorded use of spring green as a color name in English was in 1766. Displayed at right is the web color mint cream, a pastel tint of spring green. The color mint cream is a representation of the color of the interior of an after dinner mint, displayed at right is the web color honeydew, a pastel tint of spring green. The color honeydew is a representation of the color of the flesh of a honeydew melon. Aquamarine is a color that is a bright tint of spring green toned toward cyan. At right is displayed the color mint, a light tint of spring green. The color mint green is a tint of the color mint. This is a Crayola color formulated in 1990, displayed at right is the color medium spring green. Medium spring green is a web color and it is close to but not right on the color wheel and it is a little closer to cyan than to green. Cambridge blue is the commonly used by sports teams from Cambridge University. This color is actually a tone of spring green. Spring green colors are colors with an h code of between 135 and 165, this color has an h code of 140, putting it within the range of spring green colors on the RGB color wheel, at right is displayed the color Caribbean green. This is a Crayola color formulated in 1997, displayed at right is the color mountain meadow
12.
Council of Representatives of Iraq
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The Council of Representatives of Iraq is the unicameral legislature of Iraq. It is currently composed of 328 seats and meets in Baghdad inside the Green Zone, an elected Iraqi parliament first formed following the establishment of a constitutional monarchy in 1925. The 1925 constitution called for a parliament whose lower house. The upper house, the Senate was appointed by the king, ten elections took place between 1925 and the coup of 1958. On January 17,1953 elections for the Chamber of Deputies took place, following controversy over the implementation of the so-called Baghdad Pact, Prime Minister Nuri Pasha as-Said called elections the following year, in early 1954. As-Said dissolved the assembly shortly thereafter and began to rule by decree, the second 1954 election was very corrupt, with as-Saids political enemies banned from running, and widespread voter coercion. The assembly was suspended yet again, and in 1958 a military coup deposed as-Said and the monarchy, the 1970 constitution created a republic with an elected National Assembly. However, elections for the Assembly did not take place until June 1980, under Iraqs new military president, several more elections took place between 1989 and 2003. The new Assembly was largely a figurehead that would occasionally rubber stamp the presidents decrees, elections for its members were not considered free and fair by the international community. Only members of Husseins own Baath Party were ever elected, in 2003, Saddam Hussein was forcibly removed from power by the United States of America, the United Kingdom and their allies during the Iraq War. This Assembly would draft a permanent constitution which would then be submitted to approval by the Iraqi people in a general referendum, elections for this transitional National Assembly took place on January 30,2005. The United Iraqi Alliance Party won the plurality of seats with 48% of the popular vote resulting in 140 seats, eighty-five members of the assembly were women. Talks between the UIA and other parties to form a coalition government began soon after the election, the assembly had its first meeting on March 16,2005. The Assembly elected Jalal Talabani to head the Presidency Council on April 6, under the permanent constitution approved on October 15,2005, legislative authority is vested in two bodies, the Council of Representatives and the Council of Union. The Council of Representatives consists of 325 members elected for four years, the Council passes federal laws, oversees the executive, ratifies treaties, and approves nominations of specified officials. It elects the president of the republic, who selects a prime minister from the majority coalition in the Council, elections for the Council of Representatives were held on December 15,2005. The Council first met on March 16,2006, exactly one year after the first meeting of the transitional assembly. The Council of Representatives of Iraq has the name in Arabic as the lower legislative houses of Bahrain, Morocco, Jordan, and Yemen
13.
Kurdistan Parliament
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The Kurdistan Parliament, also called the Iraqi Kurdistan Parliament, is the parliament of Iraqi Kurdistan. Prior to the Kurdistan Election Law passed in March 2009, the body was referred to as the Kurdistan National Assembly, the IKP is a 111-member unicameral body in which 11 seats are reserved for non-Kurdish minority communities of the Iraqi Kurdistan region. The IKP building is located in Erbil, the capital of the Iraqi Kurdistan region. The IKP holds two sessions per year, each covering a span of four out of the year. The IKP works by committees that focus on areas such as legal affairs, education and higher education, finance and economy, or relations. Since its formation, the IKP has passed several important laws relating to administration, political parties, the press, the economy, culture, Iraqi Kurdistan Parliament is the Kurdistan Region’s democratically elected parliament. The KNA consists of one elected chamber, the three main functions of the IKP are to examine proposals for new law, to scrutinise government policy and administration, and to debate the major issues of the day. The founding principles of the IKP are liberty, pluralism, accountability, openness, to protect civilians from attacks by Iraqi military forces following the 1991 Gulf War, the US, UK and France initiated a no-fly zone above the 36th line of latitude which cuts across Kurdistan. On the ground, a security zone was established by military forces from eleven countries and these no-fly and security zones strongly supported and encouraged refugees, including those who had left in the 1970s, to return to their homes. Later in 1991, Saddam Hussein withdrew his forces and his administration, including the national flag, faced with the administrative vacuum and double embargo, the Kurdistan Front, an alliance of diverse political groups in Iraqi Kurdistan, decided to hold a general election. Their goal was to establish an administration to provide for public services. The population also expressed a desire to choose its representatives. The election, held on 19 May 1992, was the first free, voter turnout was very high and the elections were deemed to be free, fair, and democratic by international observers. After decades of dictatorship, the people in Kurdistan were able to vote for their representatives and this regional election led to the formation of the first Kurdistan National Assembly and the establishment of the Kurdistan Regional Government. The leadership and the people of the Iraqi Kurdistan region decided to part of Iraq. By 15 July 1992, the Kurdistan National Assembly had convened,1, the first law passed by the assembly, established it as the Region’s legislature. The first election for the Kurdistan National Assembly was held in 1992, no elections were then held for the next 13 years until the 2005 elections which coincided with the election of the Iraqi Interim Government and election of governorate councils. Under Article 8 of the Kurdistan Electoral Law, elections must be held four years
14.
Politics of Iraq
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The politics of Iraq place in a framework of a federal parliamentary representative democratic republic. The current Prime Minister of Iraq is Haider al-Abadi, who holds most of the executive authority, which acts as a cabinet and/or government. Before the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, the Baath Party officially ruled, Iraq was occupied by foreign troops beginning with the 2003 invasion of Iraq, with military forces coming primarily from the United States and the United Kingdom. Most foreign militaries operated under the umbrella of the Multinational force in Iraq, authorized under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1546,1637,1723, on January 1,2009 the U. S. –Iraq Status of Forces Agreement entered into force. The occupation yielded to an administrative law, which was replaced by the Constitution of Iraq following approval in a referendum held on October 15,2005. A permanent 275-member Council of Representatives was elected in the December 2005 Iraqi parliamentary election, initiating the formation of the Government of Iraq, the federal government of Iraq is defined under the current Constitution as an Islamic, democratic, federal parliamentary republic. The federal government is composed of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches, the legislative branch is composed of the Council of Representatives and a Federation Council. The executive branch is composed of the President, the Prime Minister, one such court is the Central Criminal Court. The Central Bank of Iraq, the Board of Supreme Audit, the Communications and Media Commission, the Foundation of Martyrs is attached to the Council of Ministers. The Federal Public Service Council regulates the affairs of the public service, including appointment. The basic subdivisions of the country are the regions and the governorates, both regions and governorates are given broad autonomy with regions given additional powers such as control of internal security forces for the region such as police, security forces, and guards. The last local elections for the governorates were held in the 2009 Iraqi governorate elections on 31 January 2009, the constitution requires that the Council of Representatives enact a law which provides the procedures for forming a new region 6 months from the start of its first session. A law was passed 11 October 2006 by a vote with only 138 of 275 representatives present. Legislators from the Iraqi Accord Front, Sadrist Movement and Islamic Virtue Party all opposed the bill. Under the law, a region can be created out of one or more existing governorates or two or more existing regions, and a governorate can also join an existing region to create a new region. A new region can be proposed by one third or more of the members in each affected governorate plus 500 voters or by one tenth or more voters in each affected governorate. A referendum must then be held three months, which requires a simple majority in favour to pass. In the event of competing proposals, the proposals are put to a ballot
15.
Elections in Iraq
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Elections in Iraq gives information on election and election results in Iraq. Under the Iraqi constitution of 1925, Iraq was a monarchy, with a bicameral legislature consisting of an elected House of Representatives. The lower house was elected four years by manhood suffrage. The first Parliament met in 1925, ten general elections were held before the overthrow of the monarchy in 1958. The electoral system, however, was manipulated by the King and his advisors, between 1958 and 2003 Iraq was ruled by a series of military governments, all dominated by Iraqi Arabs, particularly after the emergence of the Baath Party in the early 1960s. Under the regime of Saddam Hussein, who came to power in 1979, Kurds, Saddams rule was largely run by Sunni Arabs from Tikrit, his home region. 96% received in 1995. Outside governments dismissed the vote as lacking credibility, the multinational forces 2003 invasion of Iraq overthrew Saddams government and installed an interim administration. An initial Iraqi attempt at holding local elections was canceled by Paul Bremer and this government held elections on January 30,2005 to begin the process of writing a constitution. International groups and the formerly excluded factions claimed that the January 2005 elections were the first free elections in Iraqs history and this is in stark contrast to previous elections. After the 16 October 2002 referendum on the extension of his role as President, Saddam Hussein claimed that %100 of the voters voted yes and that %100 of Iraqis had voted. Opponents of the occupation, such as the insurgent groups, claimed the elections were not free and fair. The UN adviser to Iraqs election commission Craig Jenness said the complaints were not significant, I dont see anything that would necessitate a rerun. There were nearly 7,000 candidates standing in election and only 275 seats, so youre always going to have winners and losers. Second, The new Council of Representatives shall be elected forty-five days before the conclusion of the electoral term. The previous election had been on 15 December 2005, the opening session of the Council of Representatives had been 16 March 2006 and the first substantive session of the Council of Representatives was then held on 22 April 2006. The Court was of the opinion that the swearing in session on 16 March 2006 was the first session as required by Article 56. It therefore followed that the conclusion of the year would be on 15 March 2010. The court decided that the year referred to was the 365-day Gregorian year
16.
Central Kurdish language
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Central Kurdish, also called Sorani is a Kurdish language spoken in Iraq, mainly in Iraqi Kurdistan, as well as the Kurdistan Province of western Iran. Central Kurdish is one of the two languages of Iraq, along with Arabic, and is in political documents simply referred to as Kurdish. In Sulaymaniyah, the Ottoman Empire had created a secondary school and this allowed Central Kurdish, which was spoken in Silêmanî, to progressively replace Hawrami dialects as the literary vehicle for Kurdish. Since the fall of the Arab Socialist Baath Party – Iraq Region, as a result, Central Kurdish has become the dominant written form of Kurdish. Central Kurdish is written with a modified Arabic alphabet and this is in contrast to the other main Kurdish language, Northern Kurdish, which is spoken mainly in Turkey and is usually written in the Latin alphabet. However, during the past decade, official TV in Iraqi Kurdistan has mainly used the Latin script for Central Kurdish. The exact number of Soriani speakers is difficult to determine, but it is thought that Soriani is spoken by about 6 to 7 million people in Iraq. It is the most widespread speech of Kurds in Iran and Iraq, in particular, it is spoken by, Around 3 million Kurds in Iranian Kurdistan. Located south of Lake Urmia that stretches roughly to the outside of Kermanshah, around 3 million Kurds in Iraqi Kurdistan, including the Soriani tribe. Most of the Kurds who use it are found in the vicinity of Hewlêr, Sulaymaniyah, Kirkuk, following includes the traditional internal variants of Soriani. This region is known as Mukriyan. Ardalani, spoken in the cities of Sanandaj, Marivan, Kamyaran, Divandarreh and Dehgolan in Kordestan province and this region is known as Ardalan. Garmiani, in and around Kirkuk Hawlari, spoken in and around the city of Hawler in Iraqi Kurdistan and its main distinction is changing the consonant /l/ into /r/ in many words. Babani, spoken in and around the city of Sulaymaniya in Iraq, jafi, spoken in the towns of Javanroud, Ravansar and some villages around Sarpole Zahab and Paveh. A recent proposal was made for Central Kurdish to be the language of the Kurdistan Regional Government. This idea has been favoured by some Central Kurdish-speakers but has disappointed Northern Kurdish speakers, Sorani Kurdish has a rich consonant inventory and a fairly rich vowel inventory as well. This section makes use of the International Phonetic Alphabet, the following table contains the vowels of Sorani Kurdish. Vowels in parentheses are not phonemic, but have included in the table below because of their ubiquity in the language
17.
Northern Kurdish
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Northern Kurdish, also called Kurmanji, is a group of Kurdish dialects predominantly spoken in southeast Turkey, northwest and northeast Iran, northern Iraq and northern Syria. It is the most widespread group of the Kurdish languages. Northern Kurdish is written using the Latin script in Turkey, where most of its speakers live, northern Kurdish is the most widely spoken Kurdish language, being spoken by 80% of all Kurds. The earliest textual record of a Kurdish language dates to the 16th century, Kurmanji is also the ceremonial language of Yazidism. The sacred book Mishefa Reş and all prayers are written and spoken in Kurmanji, northern Kurdish forms a dialect continuum of great variability. Loosely, five dialect areas can be distinguished, Northwestern Kurmanji, spoken in the Kahramanmaraş, Malatya, southwestern Kurmanji, spoken in the Adıyaman, Gaziantep and Şanlıurfa provinces of Turkey and the Aleppo Governorate of Syria. Northern Kurmanji or Serhed, spoken mainly in the Ağrı, Erzurum and Muş provinces of Turkey, Southern Kurmanji, spoken in the Al-Hasakah Governorate in Syria, the Sinjar distinct in Iraq, and in several adjacent parts of Turkey centering on the Mardin and Batman provinces. Southeastern Kurmanji or Badînî, spoken in the Hakkâri province of Turkey, Anatolian Kurmanji is spoken in central Anatolia, especially in Konya, Ankara, Aksaray, by Anatolian Kurds The most distinctive of these is Badînî. Kurdish alphabets Central Kurdish dialects Southern Kurdish dialects Kurmancî, a Kurdish linguistic magazine Kurdish Institute Kurdish language, history, books, ELAR archive of Documenting a religious minority, the Dari dialect of Kerman, Iran
18.
Kurds
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The Kurds are culturally and linguistically closely related to the Iranian peoples and, as a result, are often themselves classified as an Iranian people. A recent Kurdish diaspora has also developed in Western countries, primarily in Germany, the Kurdish language refers collectively to the related dialects spoken by the Kurds. It is mainly spoken in parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria. Kurdish holds official status in Iraq as a national language alongside Arabic, is recognized in Iran as a regional language, the Kurdish languages belong to the northwestern sub‑group of the Iranian languages, which in turn belongs to the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European family. According to Mackenzie, there are few features that all Kurdish dialects have in common. And the fact that this reflects the sense of ethnic identity and unity of the Kurds. The number of Kurds living in Southwest Asia is estimated at close to 30 million, Kurds comprise anywhere from 18% to 20% of the population in Turkey, possibly as high as 25%,15 to 20% in Iraq, 10% in Iran, and 9% in Syria. Kurds form regional majorities in all four of these countries, viz. in Turkish Kurdistan, the Kurds are the fourth largest ethnic group in West Asia after the Arabs, Persians, and Turks. The total number of Kurds in 1991 was placed at 22.5 million, with 48% of this number living in Turkey, 18% in Iraq, 24% in Iran, and 4% in Syria. Recent emigration accounts for a population of close to 1.5 million in Western countries and this groups population was estimated at close to 0.4 million in 1990. The land of Karda is mentioned on a Sumerian clay-tablet dated to the 3rd millennium B. C. This land was inhabited by the people of Su who dwelt in the regions of Lake Van. Other Sumerian clay-tables referred to the people, who lived in the land of Karda, as the Qarduchi and the Qurti. Many Kurds consider themselves descended from the Medes, an ancient Iranian people, the claimed Median descent is reflected in the words of the Kurdish national anthem, We are the children of the Medes and Kai Khosrow. The Kurdish languages form a subgroup of the Northwestern Iranian languages like Median, some researchers consider the independent Kardouchoi as the ancestors of the Kurds. The term Kurd, however, is first encountered in Arabic sources of the seventh century, the Kurds have ethnically diverse origins. During the Sassanid era, in Kar-Namag i Ardashir i Pabagan, after initially sustaining a heavy defeat, Ardashir I was successful in subjugating the Kurds. In a letter Ardashir I received from his foe, Ardavan V, the usage of the term Kurd during this time period most likely was a social term, designating Northwestern Iranian nomads, rather than a concrete ethnic group
19.
Self-determination
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The right of peoples to self-determination is a cardinal principle in modern international law, binding, as such, on the United Nations as authoritative interpretation of the Charter’s norms. The principle does not state how the decision is to be made, nor what the outcome should be, whether it be independence, federation, protection, neither does it state what the delimitation between peoples should be—nor what constitutes a people. There are conflicting definitions and legal criteria for determining which groups may legitimately claim the right to self-determination, National aspirations must be respected, people may now be dominated and governed only by their own consent. Self determination is not a phrase, it is an imperative principle of action. By extension the term self-determination has come to mean the free choice of ones own acts without external compulsion, during, and after, the Industrial Revolution many groups of people recognized their shared history, geography, language, and customs. Such groups often pursued independence and sovereignty over territory, but sometimes a different sense of autonomy has been pursued or achieved, the world possessed several traditional, continental empires such as the Ottoman, Russian, Austrian/Habsburg, and the Qing Empire. During the early 19th century, competition in Europe produced multiple wars, after this conflict, the British Empire became dominant and entered its imperial century, while nationalism became a powerful political ideology in Europe. Later, after the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, New Imperialism was unleashed with France and later Germany establishing colonies in Asia, the Pacific, Japan also emerged as a new power. The Ottoman Empire, Austrian Empire, Russian Empire, Qing Empire, all ignored notions of self-determination for those governed. The French Revolution was motivated similarly and legitimatized the ideas of self-determination on that Old World continent, within the New World during the early 19th century, most of the nations of Spanish America achieved independence from Spain. The United States supported that status, as policy in the relative to European colonialism. Such support, however, never became official government policy, due to balancing of other national interests, meanwhile, in Europe itself there was a rise of nationalism, with nations such as Greece, Hungary, Poland and Bulgaria seeking or winning their independence. Karl Marx supported such nationalism, believing it might be a condition to social reform. In 1914 Vladimir Lenin wrote, would be wrong to interpret the right to self-determination as meaning anything, woodrow Wilson revived Americas commitment to self-determination, at least for European states, during World War I. When the Bolsheviks came to power in Russia in November 1917 and they also supported the right of all nations, including colonies, to self-determination. The 1918 Constitution of the Soviet Union acknowledged the right of secession for its constituent republics and this presented a challenge to Wilsons more limited demands. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918 led to Russias exit from the war, however, this imposition of states where some nationalities were given power over nationalities who disliked and distrusted them eventually helped lead to World War II. Also Germany lost land after WWI, Northern Slesvig voted to return to Denmark after a referendum, the League of Nations was proposed as much as a means of consolidating these new states, as a path to peace
20.
Human rights
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Human rights are moral principles or norms, which describe certain standards of human behaviour, and are regularly protected as legal rights in municipal and international law. They are applicable everywhere and at time in the sense of being universal. They require empathy and the rule of law and impose an obligation on persons to respect the rights of others. They should not be taken away except as a result of due process based on circumstances, for example, human rights may include freedom from unlawful imprisonment, torture. The doctrine of human rights has been influential within international law. Actions by states and non-governmental organizations form a basis of public policy worldwide, the idea of human rights suggests that if the public discourse of peacetime global society can be said to have a common moral language, it is that of human rights. The strong claims made by the doctrine of human rights continue to provoke considerable skepticism and debates about the content, nature, ancient peoples did not have the same modern-day conception of universal human rights. Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the family is the foundation of freedom. All human beings are free and equal in dignity and rights. According to Jack Donnelly, in the ancient world, traditional societies typically have had elaborate systems of duties, conceptions of justice, political legitimacy, and human flourishing that sought to realize human dignity, flourishing, or well-being entirely independent of human rights. These institutions and practices are alternative to, rather than different formulations of, one theory is that human rights were developed during the early Modern period, alongside the European secularization of Judeo-Christian ethics. The most commonly held view is that the concept of human rights evolved in the West, for example, McIntyre argues there is no word for right in any language before 1400. One of the oldest records of rights is the statute of Kalisz, giving privileges to the Jewish minority in the Kingdom of Poland such as protection from discrimination. Samuel Moyn suggests that the concept of rights is intertwined with the modern sense of citizenship. The earliest conceptualization of human rights is credited to ideas about natural rights emanating from natural law, in particular, the issue of universal rights was introduced by the examination of extending rights to indigenous peoples by Spanish clerics, such as Francisco de Vitoria and Bartolomé de Las Casas. In Britain in 1689, the English Bill of Rights and the Scottish Claim of Right each made illegal a range of oppressive governmental actions, additionally, the Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776 encoded into law a number of fundamental civil rights and civil freedoms. These were followed by developments in philosophy of human rights by philosophers such as Thomas Paine, John Stuart Mill, hegel during the 18th and 19th centuries. Although the term had been used by at least one author as early as 1742, in the 19th century, human rights became a central concern over the issue of slavery
21.
Kurdistan
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Kurdistan roughly encompasses the northwestern Zagros and the eastern Taurus mountain ranges. Contemporary use of the term refers to four parts of Kurdistan, which include southeastern Turkey, northern Syria, northern Iraq, and northwestern Iran. Iraqi Kurdistan first gained autonomous status in a 1970 agreement with the Iraqi government, there is a province by the name Kurdistan in Iran, it is not self-ruled. Kurds fighting in the Syrian Civil War were able to control of large sections of northern Syria as government forces, loyal to Bashar al-Assad. Having established their own government, they called for autonomy in a federal Syria after the war, various groups, among them the Guti, Hurrians, Mannai, and Armenians, lived in this region in antiquity. The original Mannaean homeland was situated east and south of the Lake Urmia, the region came under Persian rule during the reign of Cyrus the Great and Darius I. At its zenith, the Roman Empire ruled large Kurdish-inhabited areas, corduene became a vassal state of the Roman Republic in 66 BC and remained allied with the Romans until AD384. After 66 BC, it passed another 5 times between Rome and Persia, corduene was situated to the east of Tigranocerta, that is, to the east and south of present-day Diyarbakır in south-eastern Turkey. When the Sasanian Marzban asked Mar Abdisho about his place of origin, he replied that according to his parents, they were originally from Hazza, a village in Assyria. However they were driven out of Hazza by pagans, and settled in Tamanon. Tamanon lies just north of the modern Iraq-Turkey border, while Hazza is 12 km southwest of modern Erbil, in another passage in the same document, the region of the Khabur River is also identified as land of the Kurds. According to Al-Muqaddasi and Yaqut al-Hamawi, Tamanon was located on the south-western or southern slopes of Mount Judi, Kurdistan in the Middle Ages was a collection of semi-independent and independent states called emirates. It was nominally under indirect political or religious influence of Khalifs or Shahs, a comprehensive history of these states and their relationship with their neighbors is given in the text of Sharafnama, written by Prince Sharaf al-Din Bitlisi in 1597. The emirates included Baban, Soran, Badinan and Garmiyan in the south, Bakran, Bohtan and Badlis in the north, the earliest medieval attestation of the toponym Kurdistan is found in a 12th-century Armenian historical text by Matteos Urhayeci. He described a battle near Amid and Siverek in 1062 as to have taken place in Kurdistan, the second record occurs in the prayer from the colophon of an Armenian manuscript of the Gospels, written in 1200. A later use of the term Kurdistan is found in Empire of Trebizond documents in 1336 and in Nuzhat-al-Qulub, written by Hamdollah Mostowfi in 1340. According to Sharafkhan Bitlisi in his Sharafnama, the boundaries of the Kurdish land begin at the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf and stretch on a line to the end of Malatya. In the 16th century, after prolonged wars, Kurdish-inhabited areas were split between the Safavid and Ottoman empires, a major division of Kurdistan occurred in the aftermath of the Battle of Chaldiran in 1514, and was formalized in the 1639 Treaty of Zuhab
22.
Iraq
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The capital, and largest city, is Baghdad. The main ethnic groups are Arabs and Kurds, others include Assyrians, Turkmen, Shabakis, Yazidis, Armenians, Mandeans, Circassians, around 95% of the countrys 36 million citizens are Muslims, with Christianity, Yarsan, Yezidism, and Mandeanism also present. The official languages of Iraq are Arabic and Kurdish, two major rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, run south through Iraq and into the Shatt al-Arab near the Persian Gulf. These rivers provide Iraq with significant amounts of fertile land, the region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, historically known as Mesopotamia, is often referred to as the cradle of civilisation. It was here that mankind first began to read, write, create laws, the area has been home to successive civilisations since the 6th millennium BC. Iraq was the centre of the Akkadian, Sumerian, Assyrian and it was also part of the Median, Achaemenid, Hellenistic, Parthian, Sassanid, Roman, Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid, Ayyubid, Mongol, Safavid, Afsharid, and Ottoman empires. Iraqs modern borders were mostly demarcated in 1920 by the League of Nations when the Ottoman Empire was divided by the Treaty of Sèvres, Iraq was placed under the authority of the United Kingdom as the British Mandate of Mesopotamia. A monarchy was established in 1921 and the Kingdom of Iraq gained independence from Britain in 1932, in 1958, the monarchy was overthrown and the Iraqi Republic created. Iraq was controlled by the Arab Socialist Baath Party from 1968 until 2003, after an invasion by the United States and its allies in 2003, Saddam Husseins Baath Party was removed from power and multi-party parliamentary elections were held in 2005. The American presence in Iraq ended in 2011, but the Iraqi insurgency continued and intensified as fighters from the Syrian Civil War spilled into the country, the Arabic name العراق al-ʿIrāq has been in use since before the 6th century. There are several suggested origins for the name, one dates to the Sumerian city of Uruk and is thus ultimately of Sumerian origin, as Uruk was the Akkadian name for the Sumerian city of Urug, containing the Sumerian word for city, UR. An Arabic folk etymology for the name is rooted, well-watered. During the medieval period, there was a region called ʿIrāq ʿArabī for Lower Mesopotamia and ʿIrāq ʿajamī, for the region now situated in Central and Western Iran. The term historically included the south of the Hamrin Mountains. The term Sawad was also used in early Islamic times for the region of the plain of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. In English, it is either /ɪˈrɑːk/ or /ɪˈræk/, the American Heritage Dictionary, the pronunciation /aɪˈræk/ is frequently heard in U. S. media. Since approximately 10,000 BC, Iraq was one of centres of a Caucasoid Neolithic culture where agriculture, the following Neolithic period is represented by rectangular houses. At the time of the pre-pottery Neolithic, people used vessels made of stone, gypsum, finds of obsidian tools from Anatolia are evidences of early trade relations
23.
Barham Salih
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Barham Ahmed Salih is an Iraqi Kurdish politician. He is the prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraqi Kurdistan. Dr. Barham Salih was born in 1960 in the city of Sulaymaniyah in Iraqi Kurdistan, once release he finished high school he left Iraq for the United Kingdom because of continuous persecution. Dr. Barham Salih joined the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan in late 1976 where he became a member of the PUK department of Europe, and was in charge of PUK foreign relations in London. In addition to the struggle, he finished his university studies and received a Bachelors degree in Civil Engineering. He continued to study and obtained a Doctorate degree in Statistics and he was elected a member of the PUK leadership at the first party conference when Iraqi Kurdistan was liberated from the Baath Party following the first Gulf War. He was assigned the task of heading the PUK Office in the United States, Salih appeared on The Colbert Report on June 10,2009, broadcast from Baghdad, and was interviewed by the host. He praised the U. S. military for freeing Iraq, Barham Salih spearheaded the Kurdistani List in the Iraqi Kurdistan legislative election,2009. The list won 59 of 111 seats and he succeeded Nechervan Idris Barzani as the Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government. He survived the first motion of no confidence in Iraqi Kurdistan following the 2011 Kurdish protests in Iraq and he signed the first major oil contract with Exxon Mobil after drafting and amending a new oil law. Dr. Barham Salihs official website Dr. Barham Salih on Facebook Dr. Barham Salih on Twitter Dr. Barham Salih on YouTube
24.
Mahabad Republic
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The Republic of Mahabad was a short-lived self-governing state in present-day Iran. The Republic of Mahabad arose alongside the Azerbaijan Peoples Government, a similarly short-lived state, the capital of Republic of Mahabad was the city of Mahabad, in northwestern Iran. The state encompassed a small territory, including Mahabad and the adjacent cities of Bukan, Piranshahr, the republics foundation and demise was a part of the Iran crisis during the opening stages of the Cold War. Iran was invaded by the Allies in late August 1941, with the Soviets controlling the north, in the absence of a central government, the Soviets attempted to attach northwestern Iran to the Soviet Union, and promoted Kurdish nationalism. From these factors resulted a Kurdish manifesto that above all sought autonomy, in the town of Mahabad, inhabited mostly by Kurds, a committee of middle-class people supported by tribal chiefs took over the local administration. A political party called the Society for the Revival of Kurdistan was formed, Qazi Muhammad, head of a family of religious jurists, was elected as chairman of the party. Although the republic was not declared until December 1945, Qazis committee administered the area for more than five years until the fall of the republic. In September 1945, Qazi Muhammad and other Kurdish leaders visited Tabriz to seek the backing of a Soviet consul to found a new republic, there, they learned that the Democratic Party of Azerbaijan was planning to take control of Iranian Azerbaijan. On December 10, the Democratic Party took control of East Azerbaijan Province from Iranian government forces, Qazi Muhammad decided to do likewise, and on December 15, the Kurdish Peoples Government was founded in Mahabad. On January 22,1946, Qazi Muhammad announced the formation of the Republic of Mahabad, some of the aims mentioned in the manifesto include, Autonomy for the Iranian Kurds within the Iranian state. The use of Kurdish as the medium of education and administration, the election of a provincial council for Kurdistan to supervise state and social matters. All state officials to be of local origin, unity and fraternity with the Azerbaijani people. The establishment of a law for both peasants and notables. The Republic of Mahabad depended on Soviet support, archibald Bulloch Roosevelt, Jr. grandson of the former U. S. However, its close relationship to the USSR alienated the republic from most Western powers, causing them to side with Iran. Qazi Muhammad did not deny that his republic was funded and supplied by the Soviets and he claimed that this was a lie fabricated by the Iranian military authorities, and added that his ideals were very different from the Soviets. Following the fall of Mahabad, the Soviets allowed for the passage of Mustafa Barzani. Both contemporary friends and foes tended to exaggerate the Soviet role in the Republic of Mahabad and this notion was also widespread amongst Kurdish tribal leaders, many of whom disagreed with Qazis leadership. The Soviets were however generally ambivalent towards the Kurdish administration and they did not maintain a garrison near Mahabad and also did not have any civil agent of sufficient standing to exercise any great influence
25.
Iran
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Iran, also known as Persia, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, is a sovereign state in Western Asia. Comprising a land area of 1,648,195 km2, it is the second-largest country in the Middle East, with 82.8 million inhabitants, Iran is the worlds 17th-most-populous country. It is the country with both a Caspian Sea and an Indian Ocean coastline. The countrys central location in Eurasia and Western Asia, and its proximity to the Strait of Hormuz, Tehran is the countrys capital and largest city, as well as its leading economic and cultural center. Iran is the site of to one of the worlds oldest civilizations, the area was first unified by the Iranian Medes in 625 BC, who became the dominant cultural and political power in the region. The empire collapsed in 330 BC following the conquests of Alexander the Great, under the Sassanid Dynasty, Iran again became one of the leading powers in the world for the next four centuries. Beginning in 633 AD, Arabs conquered Iran and largely displaced the indigenous faiths of Manichaeism and Zoroastrianism by Islam, Iran became a major contributor to the Islamic Golden Age that followed, producing many influential scientists, scholars, artists, and thinkers. During the 18th century, Iran reached its greatest territorial extent since the Sassanid Empire, through the late 18th and 19th centuries, a series of conflicts with Russia led to significant territorial losses and the erosion of sovereignty. Popular unrest culminated in the Persian Constitutional Revolution of 1906, which established a monarchy and the countrys first legislative body. Following a coup instigated by the U. K. Growing dissent against foreign influence and political repression led to the 1979 Revolution, Irans rich cultural legacy is reflected in part by its 21 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the third-largest number in Asia and 11th-largest in the world. Iran is a member of the UN, ECO, NAM, OIC. Its political system is based on the 1979 Constitution which combines elements of a democracy with a theocracy governed by Islamic jurists under the concept of a Supreme Leadership. A multicultural country comprising numerous ethnic and linguistic groups, most inhabitants are Shia Muslims, the largest ethnic groups in Iran are the Persians, Azeris, Kurds and Lurs. Historically, Iran has been referred to as Persia by the West, due mainly to the writings of Greek historians who called Iran Persis, meaning land of the Persians. As the most extensive interactions the Ancient Greeks had with any outsider was with the Persians, however, Persis was originally referred to a region settled by Persians in the west shore of Lake Urmia, in the 9th century BC. The settlement was then shifted to the end of the Zagros Mountains. In 1935, Reza Shah requested the international community to refer to the country by its native name, opposition to the name change led to the reversal of the decision, and Professor Ehsan Yarshater, editor of Encyclopædia Iranica, propagated a move to use Persia and Iran interchangeably
26.
KDP-I
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The Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, also known as the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran, is a militant leftist ethnic party of Kurds in Iran, exiled in northern Iraq. It is banned in Iran and thus not able to operate openly and it calls for self-determination of Kurdish people and has been described as seeking either separatism or autonomy within a federal system. Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps officials have called the party a terrorist organization, hyeran Jo of Texas A&M University classifies KDPI as compliant rebels, i. e. rebels that kill fewer than 100 and refrain from killing for more than half of their operating years. Qazi Muhammad founded the PDKI in Mahabad, Iran, on 16 August 1945, on 22 January 1946, Qazi Muhammad declared a Kurdish Republic of Kurdistan, of which he formally became president. The Republic lasted less than a year, after the USSR retreated from the area, after the fall of the Republic, many of the PDKI leaders were arrested and executed, effectively ending the party. In 1958, the PDKI was on the verge of unifying with the Iraqi Kurdistan Democratic Party, but was then dismantled by the SAVAK secret police. The remains of the PDKI continued to support the KDP, but this changed as the Shah started aiding the KDP, in return for the Shahs aid, the KDP decerased its support for the PDKI. The Committee began a revolution in March 1967, ending after 18 months. After reforms by a new leader, Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou, the PDKI fought alongside Islamic and Marxist movements against the Shah, khomeinis new Islamic regime, however, refused the Kurdish demands, suppressing the PDKI and other Kurdish parties. The PDKI continued its activities in exile, hoping to achieve Kurdish national rights within a federal republic of Iran. The highest PDKI organ is the Central Committee, composed of 21 permanent and 10 substitute members, the Central Committee elects 7 of its members for the executive Political Bureau, which also includes the Secretary-General. The current Secretary-General is Mustafa Hijri, sadeq Sharafkandis murder became an international incident between Germany and Iran. On 17 September 1992, PDKI leaders Sadegh Sharafkandi, Fattah Abdoli, Homayoun Ardalan and their translator Nouri Dehkordi were assassinated at the Mykonos Greek restaurant in Berlin, Germany. In the Mykonos trial, the courts found Kazem Darabi, an Iranian national who worked as a grocer in Berlin, two other Lebanese, Youssef Amin and Mohamed Atris, were convicted of being accessories to murder. The PDKI has held fifteen congresses and these occurred in 1945,1964,1971,1980,1982,1984,1985,1988,1992,1995,1997,2000,2004,2008,2012. During the 20th Congress of the Socialist International, held at the headquarters of the United Nations in New York City, in 2005, the PDKIs membership was elevated to consultative status. Qazi Muhammad Ahmad Tofiq Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou Sadegh Sharafkandi Abdullah Hasanzadeh Mustafa Hijri The PDKI English language homepage
27.
KDP
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The Kurdistan Democratic Party, usually abbreviated as KDP or PDK, is one of the main Kurdish parties in Iraqi Kurdistan. It was founded in 1946 in Mahabad in Iranian Kurdistan, the KDP has been described as being controlled by Barzani tribe. In 1946, the leader of the Soviet-backed Republic of Mahabad, Qazi Muhammad, announced the formation of a Kurdish Democratic Party based in Iran, or Eastern Kurdistan. The Soviet Union, then supporting the Kurdish national struggle against the monarchies of Iran and Iraq and it was well-known in nationalist circles that the relations between the two men were not easy. Barzani attempted to create a special dispensation for the Barzanis in Iran, but Qazi rebuffed them stating There is to be one party. In the meantime, Barzani was negotiating with Baghdad to allow his return to Iraq, the new KDP of Iraq held its first congress in Baghdad on August 16,1946. The 32 delegates elected a committee with Hamza Abd Allah as secretary-general, Shaykh Latif and Kaka Ziyad Agha as vice-presidents. The party demanded autonomy for Iraqi Kurdistan, stating that the political, the party programme was not specific about any social or economic content for fear of alienating the highly conservative tribal chiefs and landlords who had agreed to support it. After the collapse of the Mahabad republic in early 1947, Ibrahim Ahmad, previously the Sulaymaniyah representative of the Iranian KDP, joined the Iraqi KDP. Throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, the KDP and the Kurdish members of the Iraqi Communist Party steadily increased their working relationship – in many cases fielding joint candidates. By 1954 the KDP was advocating the replacement of the Iraqi monarchy with a democratic republic – much to the consternation of many of their tribal supporters. On July 14,1958, Brigadier Abd al-Karim Qasim and his fellow Free Officers staged a coup that promised a brighter future for the Kurds of Iraq. Although the KDP and ICP were excluded from the new United National Front government, Qasim formed a three-man Sovereignty Council of a Sunni, a Shii, and a Kurd. The KDP immediately pledged its support for the new regime, in its newspaper hailing a new era of freedom and equality for the Kurdish, Ibrahim Ahmad attempted to pressure Qasim into including Kurdish autonomy in the Provisional Constitution. However, Qasim was under greater pressure from his deputy Abdul Salam Arif. They objected to Qasims apparently pro-Kurdish attitude and his friendliness towards Mustafa Barzani in particular, Qasim had officially named him Chairman of the KDP, gave him one of Nuri as-Saids old residences in Baghdad, an automobile, and a handsome monthly stipend. While the Communists and Kurds settled scores, Qasim used the revolt as a pretext to purge Nationalists and Baathists from the Iraqi armed forces and government. Qasim used an almost identical event that July, but this time in Kirkuk, as a pretext to act against the KDPs closest allies, the Communists
28.
Qazi Muhammad
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Qazi Muhammad was a Kurdish separatist leader who headed the Republic of Mahabad. He was hanged by Pahlavi dynasty for treason, Qazi Muhammad acted as the President of the Republic of Kurdistan in 1946. He was also the founder of the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran, mustafa Barzani, one of the leaders of the nationalist Kurdish movement in Iraqi Kurdistan, was also the commander of its army. His cousin Mohammed Hossein Saif Qazi was a minister in his cabinet, a year later, after the Soviets withdrew from Iran, the Kurdish Republic was crushed by Irans central government. An Iranian military court sentenced Qazi and two of his associates to death by hanging in Chwarchira Square, in the center of the city of Mahabad and they were left hanging for more than two days. One of his sons, Ali Qazi, is today a member in the Kurdish movement. One of his daughters, Efat Ghazi, was killed by a bomb in Västerås, Sweden. The bomb was addressed to her husband, the Kurdish activist Emir Ghazi, some analysts speculated that the Iranian government might have been involved in the assassination. Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran Mahabad Republic Timeline of Kurdish uprisings Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou Sadeq Sharafkandi Simko
29.
Mustafa Barzani
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Mustafa Barzani, also known as Mullah Mustafa, was a Kurdish nationalist leader, and the most prominent political figure in modern Kurdish politics. In 1946, he was chosen as the leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party to lead the Kurdish revolution against Iraqi regimes, Barzani was the primary political and military leader of the Kurdish revolution until his death in March 1979. He led campaigns of armed struggle against both the Iraqi and Iranian governments, Mustafa Barzani was born in 1903 in Barzan, a village in northern Iraqi Kurdistan. Following an insurrection launched by his tribe, he, his mother and the rest of his family were imprisoned and his father, grandfather, and a brother were later executed by the Ottoman authorities for other insurrections. At an early age he joined other tribal fighters in aiding Sheikh Mahmud Barzanjis revolt against the British in Iraq. In 1931 he followed his brother, the Barzani chieftain Ahmed Barzani. Iraq received help from its British allies, who engaged in warfare against territories in rebellion. On the advice of Sheikh Ahmed, Mustafa Barzani surrendered to Iraq, Mustafa Barzani was kept under surveillance until 1943, when he again broke free from his exile in Sulaymaniyah as Iraq underwent the effects of World War II. Despite differences between Qazi Muhammad and Mustafa Barzani, the arrival of Barzanis forces gave a boost to the ability of the nationalists to assert control over the region. In December 1945 the Kurdish Republic of Kurdistan was declared by Qazi Muhammad, Barzani was appointed as the Minister of Defense and commander of the Kurdish army in the Republic of Kurdistan. In May 1946 the Soviet troops were withdrawn from Iran and all support for the Republic of Kurdistan was cut, Barzani and his followers arrived in the Armenian SSR and were put in a camp near Nakhchevan. After appealing to the Soviet Union to help them, Barzani and his followers were transferred to the Azerbaijani SSR, kept in camps near, Barzani met with Azerbaijan Communist Party officials, who under orders from Moscow were told to help the Kurds. In November 1947, Barzani met for the first time Mir Jafar Baghirov, Barzanis followers were organized into a military regiment and received training in military tactics and politics, as well as education to learn to read and write Kurdish. On January 19,1948, a conference was held gathering Kurds from Iraq and Iran in Baku and this prompted Iran to again demand that the Soviet Union extradite Barzani and his followers to Iran to stand trial, which the Soviet Union rejected. Barzani however fast ran into problems with Baghirov due to differences and stances towards the Kurdish movement, Barzani and the others were transferred to the Uzbek SSR in August 1948, but Baghriovs disputes with Barzani were not forgotten. For the following three years, Barzani was separated from his followers, prompting them to engage in sit-ins and strikes demanding they be reunited, Barzani sent numerous letters to Moscow, addressing them to Joseph Stalin himself, requesting that he and his followers be treated better and reunited. Only one of these reached the Kremlin and shortly afterwards on March 1951, Soviet officials began investigations to address the concerns of Barzani. All of them were provided with jobs, education, training, Barzani would later meet with Soviet figures like Georgy Malenkov and Nikita Khrushchev in May 1953 after the death of Stalin to ensure that the Soviets would continue helping him and his followers
30.
Ba'ath Party
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The Arab Socialist Baath Party was a political party founded in Syria by Michel Aflaq, Salah al-Din al-Bitar, and associates of Zaki al-Arsuzi. The party espoused Baathism, which is an ideology mixing Arab nationalist, pan-Arabism, Arab socialist, Baathism calls for unification of the Arab world into a single state. Its motto, Unity, Liberty, Socialism, refers to Arab unity, the party was founded by the merger of the Arab Baath Movement, led by Aflaq and al-Bitar, and the Arab Baath, led by al-Arsuzi, on 7 April 1947 as the Arab Baath Party. The party quickly established branches in other Arab countries, although it would hold power in Iraq. The Arab Baath Party merged with the Arab Socialist Party, led by Akram al-Hawrani, the newly formed party was a relative success, and became the second-largest party in the Syrian parliament in the 1954 election. This, coupled with the strength of the Syrian Communist Party, led to the establishment of the United Arab Republic. The union would prove unsuccessful, and a Syrian coup in 1961 dissolved the union, following the break-up of the UAR, the Baath Party was reconstituted. However, during the UAR, military activists had established the Military Committee to take control of the Baath Party from civilian hands. In the meantime, in Iraq, the local Baath Party branch had taken power by orchestrating and leading the Ramadan Revolution, the Military Committee, with Aflaqs consent, took power in Syria in the 8th of March Revolution of 1963. A power struggle developed between the civilian faction led by Aflaq, al-Bitar, and Munif al-Razzaz and the Military Committee led by Salah Jadid. As relations between the two deteriorated, the Military Committee initiated the 1966 Syrian coup détat which ousted the National Command led by al-Razzaz, Aflaq. The 1966 coup split the Baath Party between the Iraqi-dominated Baath movement and the Syrian-dominated Baath movement, other regional branches were established throughout the Arab world in the later 1940s and early 1950s, in, among others, Iraq, Yemen and Jordan. Throughout its existence, the National Command, gave most attention to Syrian affairs, the congress is notable for sanctioning the merger of the Arab Socialist Party and the Baath Party, which took place in 1952. 90 percent of Baath Party members who stood for elections were elected to parliament, the failure of the traditional parties represented by the Peoples Party and the National Party, strengthened the Baath Partys public credibility. Through this position, the party was able to get two of its members into the cabinet, Bitar was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs and Khalil Kallas became Minister of Economics. Its new, strengthened position, was used successful to garner support for Syrias merger with Gamal Abdel Nassers Egypt, which led to the establishment of the United Arab Republic in 1958. On 24 June 1959, Fuad al-Rikabi, the Regional Secretary of the Iraqi Regional Branch, Rimawi reacted to his expulsion by forming his own party, the Arab Socialist Revolutionary Baath Party, which established a rival National Command to compete with the original. In Iraq, the Iraqi Regional Branch had supported Abd al-Karim Qasims seizure of power, the Iraqi Baathists supported Qasim on the ground that they believed he would enter Iraq into the UAR, enlarging the Arab nationalist republic
31.
Abdul Salam Arif
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‘Abd ul-Salam Mohammed ‘Arif Aljumaily was the second President of Iraq from 1963 until his death. He played a role in the 14 July Revolution in which the Hashemite monarchy was overthrown on July 14,1958. Along with Abdel Karim Qasim and other Iraqi military officers, Arif was a member of the clandestine organisation, like Qasim, Arif served with distinction in the otherwise unsuccessful 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict, where he captured Jenin in what is now the West Bank part of Palestine. During the summer of 1958, Prime Minister Nuri as-Said ordered Iraqi troops under Arif to aid Jordan, instead, however, he led his army units into Baghdad and on July 14 launched a coup against the Hashemite monarchy. Qasim formed a government under the newly proclaimed republic and Arif, his aide, was appointed deputy prime minister, interior minister. Almost immediately however, tensions rose between the pan-Arabist Arif and Iraqi nationalist Qasim who also had the support of the Iraqi Communist Party. The former supported a union with the United Arab Republic —composed of Egypt and Syria—under president Gamal Abdel Nasser, as a result, the two leaders engaged in a power struggle, ending in Qasim prevailing and the removal of Arif from his positions on September 12. He was appointed the low-ranking post of ambassador to Bonn, Arif refused to take up the post and upon returning to Baghdad on November 4, he was promptly arrested for plotting against the state. He was sentenced to death along with Rashid Ali al-Gaylani in February 1959, Qasim had him released in November 1961. Qasim was overthrown on February 8,1963, by a coalition of Baathists, army units, Arif had previously been selected as the leader of the Iraqi Revolutionary Command Council and after the coup he was elected president of Iraq due to his popularity. Qasim pleaded with Arif to be exiled instead of executed and reminded Arif that he had commuted his death two years before. Nonetheless, Arif demanded that Qasim swear to the Quran that it was he, Arif, Qasim refused and was consequently executed. Although he was chosen as president, more power was held by the Baathist prime minister, following a Baathist-led coup in Syria in March 1963, Arif entered his country into reunification talks with Syria and Egypt. After a fallout with Nasser in July, the Baathist government of Iraq removed all non-Baathist members from the cabinet, despite Arifs support for Nasser. On November 18, Arif, with the support of disaffected elements in the military, Arif formed a new cabinet, retaining a few Baathists, but mostly made up of Nasserist army officers and technocrats. He maintained his presidency and appointed himself chief-of-staff, a month later he handed the latter post to his brother General Abdul Rahman Arif, and the premiership to his confidant Lieutenant-General Tahir Yahya. In the fall of 1964, the Baath attempted to depose Arif, Arif had the conspirators, including Saddam Hussein, arrested. On May 26,1964, Arif established the Joint Presidency Council with Egypt and it was nearly identical in structure the ASU of Egypt and like in Egypt, many of the Arab nationalist parties were dissolved and absorbed by the ASU
32.
Marxist-Leninist
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Marxism–Leninism is a political philosophy or world view founded on ideas of Classical Marxism and Leninism, and seeks to establish socialist states and develop them further. Marxism–Leninism first became a philosophical movement in the Soviet Union during the 1920s. It rejected the notions, common among Marxists at the time, of revolution as a prerequisite for building socialism in Russia. The internationalism of Marxism–Leninism was expressed in supporting revolutions in foreign countries, trotskyists claim that Marxism–Leninism led to the establishment of a degenerated workers state. Criticism like this has itself been criticised for philosophical determinism—i. e. that the events in the movements history were predetermined by their convictions. In complete contrast, E. Van Ree argues that Stalin continued to be in agreement with the classical works of Marxism until his death. Within five years of Vladimir Lenins death in 1924, Stalin completed his rise to power in the Soviet Union, according to G. Lisichkin, Stalin compiled Marxism–Leninism as a separate ideology in his book Concerning Questions of Leninism. During the period of Stalins rule in the Soviet Union, Marxism–Leninism was proclaimed the ideology of the state. There is no agreement amongst historians regarding whether or not Stalin actually followed the principles established by Karl Marx. After the Sino-Soviet split of the 1960s, the communist parties of the Soviet Union, after the death of Mao on 1976, Peruvian Maoists associated with the Communist Party of Peru coined the term Marxism–Leninism–Maoism, arguing that Maoism was a more advanced stage of Marxism. In North Korea, Marxism–Leninism was officially superseded in 1977 by Juche, in concepts of class and class struggle, in other words Marxism itself. However, the government is sometimes referred to as Marxist–Leninist, or more commonly as Stalinist, due to its political. Originally and for a time the concept of a socialist society was regarded as equal to that of a communist society. However, it was Lenin who defined the difference between socialism and communism, explaining that they are similar to what Marx described with the lower and upper stages of communist society. For Marxism–Leninism, the USSR was a state and thus any property under this State was a type of socialist property. This is part of Marxist–Leninists advocacy of promoting and reinforcing the operation of a planned socialist economy and it advocates universal education with a focus on developing the proletariat with knowledge, class consciousness, and understanding the historical development of communism. Marxism–Leninism supports the emancipation of women and ending the exploitation of women, Marxist–Leninist cultural policy focuses upon modernisation and distancing society from, the past, the bourgeoisie, and the old intelligentsia. Agitprop and various associations and institutions are used by the Marxist–Leninist state to educate society with the values of communism, the state serves as a safeguard for the ownership and as the coordinator of production through a universal economic plan
33.
Kurdish People
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The Kurds are culturally and linguistically closely related to the Iranian peoples and, as a result, are often themselves classified as an Iranian people. A recent Kurdish diaspora has also developed in Western countries, primarily in Germany, the Kurdish language refers collectively to the related dialects spoken by the Kurds. It is mainly spoken in parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria. Kurdish holds official status in Iraq as a national language alongside Arabic, is recognized in Iran as a regional language, the Kurdish languages belong to the northwestern sub‑group of the Iranian languages, which in turn belongs to the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European family. According to Mackenzie, there are few features that all Kurdish dialects have in common. And the fact that this reflects the sense of ethnic identity and unity of the Kurds. The number of Kurds living in Southwest Asia is estimated at close to 30 million, Kurds comprise anywhere from 18% to 20% of the population in Turkey, possibly as high as 25%,15 to 20% in Iraq, 10% in Iran, and 9% in Syria. Kurds form regional majorities in all four of these countries, viz. in Turkish Kurdistan, the Kurds are the fourth largest ethnic group in West Asia after the Arabs, Persians, and Turks. The total number of Kurds in 1991 was placed at 22.5 million, with 48% of this number living in Turkey, 18% in Iraq, 24% in Iran, and 4% in Syria. Recent emigration accounts for a population of close to 1.5 million in Western countries and this groups population was estimated at close to 0.4 million in 1990. The land of Karda is mentioned on a Sumerian clay-tablet dated to the 3rd millennium B. C. This land was inhabited by the people of Su who dwelt in the regions of Lake Van. Other Sumerian clay-tables referred to the people, who lived in the land of Karda, as the Qarduchi and the Qurti. Many Kurds consider themselves descended from the Medes, an ancient Iranian people, the claimed Median descent is reflected in the words of the Kurdish national anthem, We are the children of the Medes and Kai Khosrow. The Kurdish languages form a subgroup of the Northwestern Iranian languages like Median, some researchers consider the independent Kardouchoi as the ancestors of the Kurds. The term Kurd, however, is first encountered in Arabic sources of the seventh century, the Kurds have ethnically diverse origins. During the Sassanid era, in Kar-Namag i Ardashir i Pabagan, after initially sustaining a heavy defeat, Ardashir I was successful in subjugating the Kurds. In a letter Ardashir I received from his foe, Ardavan V, the usage of the term Kurd during this time period most likely was a social term, designating Northwestern Iranian nomads, rather than a concrete ethnic group
34.
Gulf War
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The Iraqi Armys occupation of Kuwait that began 2 August 1990 was met with international condemnation, and brought immediate economic sanctions against Iraq by members of the UN Security Council. US President George H. W. Bush deployed US forces into Saudi Arabia, an array of nations joined the coalition, the largest military alliance since World War II. The great majority of the military forces were from the US, with Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom. Kuwait and Saudi Arabia paid around US$32 billion of the US$60 billion cost, the war was marked by the introduction of live news broadcasts from the front lines of the battle, principally by the US network CNN. The war has also earned the nickname Video Game War after the daily broadcast of images from cameras on board US bombers during Operation Desert Storm. The initial conflict to expel Iraqi troops from Kuwait began with an aerial and naval bombardment on 17 January 1991 and this was followed by a ground assault on 24 February. This was a victory for the coalition forces, who liberated Kuwait. The coalition ceased its advance, and declared a ceasefire 100 hours after the campaign started. Aerial and ground combat was confined to Iraq, Kuwait, Iraq launched Scud missiles against coalition military targets in Saudi Arabia and against Israel. The following names have been used to describe the conflict itself, Gulf War, a problem with these terms is that the usage is ambiguous, having now been applied to at least three conflicts, see Gulf War. The use of the term Persian Gulf is also disputed, see Persian Gulf naming dispute, with no consensus of naming, various publications have attempted to refine the name. Other language terms include French, la Guerre du Golfe and German, Golfkrieg, German, Zweiter Golfkrieg, French, most of the coalition states used various names for their operations and the wars operational phases. Operation Desert Storm was the US name of the conflict from 17 January 1991. Operation Desert Sabre was the US name for the offensive against the Iraqi Army in the Kuwaiti Theater of Operations from 24–28 February 1991, in itself. Operation Desert Farewell was the given to the return of US units and equipment to the US in 1991 after Kuwaits liberation. Operation Granby was the British name for British military activities during the operations, Opération Daguet was the French name for French military activities in the conflict. Operation Friction was the name of the Canadian operations Operazione Locusta was the Italian name for the operations, in addition, various phases of each operation may have a unique operational name. The US divided the conflict into three campaigns, Defense of Saudi Arabian country for the period 2 August 1990, through 16 January 1991
35.
Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iraq
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The Kurdistan Democratic Party, usually abbreviated as KDP or PDK, is one of the main Kurdish parties in Iraqi Kurdistan. It was founded in 1946 in Mahabad in Iranian Kurdistan, the KDP has been described as being controlled by Barzani tribe. In 1946, the leader of the Soviet-backed Republic of Mahabad, Qazi Muhammad, announced the formation of a Kurdish Democratic Party based in Iran, or Eastern Kurdistan. The Soviet Union, then supporting the Kurdish national struggle against the monarchies of Iran and Iraq and it was well-known in nationalist circles that the relations between the two men were not easy. Barzani attempted to create a special dispensation for the Barzanis in Iran, but Qazi rebuffed them stating There is to be one party. In the meantime, Barzani was negotiating with Baghdad to allow his return to Iraq, the new KDP of Iraq held its first congress in Baghdad on August 16,1946. The 32 delegates elected a committee with Hamza Abd Allah as secretary-general, Shaykh Latif and Kaka Ziyad Agha as vice-presidents. The party demanded autonomy for Iraqi Kurdistan, stating that the political, the party programme was not specific about any social or economic content for fear of alienating the highly conservative tribal chiefs and landlords who had agreed to support it. After the collapse of the Mahabad republic in early 1947, Ibrahim Ahmad, previously the Sulaymaniyah representative of the Iranian KDP, joined the Iraqi KDP. Throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, the KDP and the Kurdish members of the Iraqi Communist Party steadily increased their working relationship – in many cases fielding joint candidates. By 1954 the KDP was advocating the replacement of the Iraqi monarchy with a democratic republic – much to the consternation of many of their tribal supporters. On July 14,1958, Brigadier Abd al-Karim Qasim and his fellow Free Officers staged a coup that promised a brighter future for the Kurds of Iraq. Although the KDP and ICP were excluded from the new United National Front government, Qasim formed a three-man Sovereignty Council of a Sunni, a Shii, and a Kurd. The KDP immediately pledged its support for the new regime, in its newspaper hailing a new era of freedom and equality for the Kurdish, Ibrahim Ahmad attempted to pressure Qasim into including Kurdish autonomy in the Provisional Constitution. However, Qasim was under greater pressure from his deputy Abdul Salam Arif. They objected to Qasims apparently pro-Kurdish attitude and his friendliness towards Mustafa Barzani in particular, Qasim had officially named him Chairman of the KDP, gave him one of Nuri as-Saids old residences in Baghdad, an automobile, and a handsome monthly stipend. While the Communists and Kurds settled scores, Qasim used the revolt as a pretext to purge Nationalists and Baathists from the Iraqi armed forces and government. Qasim used an almost identical event that July, but this time in Kirkuk, as a pretext to act against the KDPs closest allies, the Communists
36.
Iraqi Kurdish Civil War
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Between 3,000 and 5,000 fighters and civilians were killed. According to some estimates however, upwards of 8,000 civilians alone could have been killed throughout the more than three years of warfare, a Legislative Assembly was established in the city of Erbil with nominal authority over the Kurdish-populated governorates of Erbil, Dahuk and As Sulaymaniyah. While the no-fly zone covered Dahuk and Erbil, it left out Sulaymaniyah and this led to a further series of bloody clashes between Iraqi forces and Kurdish troops. Shortly thereafter, a balance of power was reached, and Iraq withdrew its military. The region then adopted its own flag and national anthem, Iraqi Kurdistan held parliamentary elections in 1992. As a result of the election, the Kurdish parliament had been split between Jalal Talabanis Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and Massoud Barzanis Kurdish Democratic Party. After withdrawing its forces from Kurdistan in October 1991, the Iraqi government imposed a blockade over the region, restricting its oil. The United Nations embargo on Iraq also significantly affected the Kurdish economy, as such, all economic dealings between Iraqi Kurdistan and the outside world were done through the black market. Fighting broke out between the two factions in May 1994, the clashes left around 300 people dead. Over the next year, around 2,000 people were killed on both sides, according to CIA agent Robert Baer, members of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps provided limited support to the KDP and allowed the KDP to launch attacks from Iranian territory. In January 1995, CIA case officer Robert Baer traveled to northern Iraq with a team to set up a CIA station. He made contact with the Kurdish leadership and managed to negotiate a truce between Barzani and Talabani, within days, Baer made contact with an Iraqi general who was plotting to assassinate Saddam Hussein. His plan was to use a unit of 100 renegade Iraqi troops to kill Saddam as he passed over a bridge near Tikrit, Baer cabled the plan to Washington but did not hear anything back. Baer again cabled the plan to Washington and received no response, on 28 February, the Iraqi Army was placed on full alert. In response, the Iranian and Turkish militaries were also placed on high alert, Baer received a message directly from National Security Advisor Tony Lake telling him his operation was compromised. This warning was passed on to the Kurdish and Iraqi allies, with this new information, Barzani backed out of the planned offensive, leaving Talabanis PUK forces to carry it out alone. The Iraqi Army officers planning to kill Saddam with tank fire were compromised, arrested and executed before they could carry out the operation, the PUKs offensive was still launched as planned, and within days they managed to destroy three Iraqi Army divisions and capture 5,000 prisoners. Despite Baers pleas for American support of the offensive, none was offered, Baer was immediately recalled from Iraq and briefly investigated for the attempted murder of Saddam Hussein
37.
Ansar al-Islam
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Ansar al-Islam or Ansar al-Islam fi Kurdistan was a Kurdish Sunni Muslim insurgent group in Iraq and Syria. Its ideology follows an interpretation of the Koran and promotes a return to the example of the first Muslims. Following the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the became an insurgent group which fought against the American led forces. The group continued to fight the Iraqi Government following the withdrawal of U. S. troops from Iraq, and sent members to Syria to fight the Government following the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War. The group was a designated terrorist organization in the United Nations, Australia, Canada, Israel, the United Kingdom and the United States, however, some small elements within Ansar al-Islam rejected this merger, and continued to function as an independent organization. Ansar al-Islam was formed in September 2001 from a merger of Jund al-Islam, led by Abu Abdullah al-Shafii, Krekar became the leader of the merged Ansar al-Islam, which opposed an agreement made between IMK and the dominant Kurdish group in the area, Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. The group later made an allegiance to al-Qaeda and allegedly received funds from the terror network. Ansar al-Islam initially comprised approximately 300 men, many of them veterans of the Soviet–Afghan War, during its stay in the Biyara region near the Iranian border, there were allegations of logistical support from powerful factions in Iran. The roots of Ansar al-Islam can be traced to the mid-1990s, the group consists of various Islamist factions that splintered from the Islamic Movement of Kurdistan. In 2001, shortly before the 9/11 attacks, leaders of several Kurdish Islamist factions visited the leadership in Afghanistan planning to create a base for al-Qaida in northern Iraq. A document found in Kabul stated the groups objectives, which was to expel those Jews and Christians from Kurdistan and join the way of jihad, rule every piece of land … with the Islamic Sharia rule. This was also confirmed by the Los Angeles Times, based upon interviews with an Ansar prisoner and they received the message from bin Laden that Kurdish Islamic cells should unite. Villagers under Ansar al-Islams control were subjected to harsh sharia laws, musical instruments were destroyed, the only school for girls in the area was destroyed, and all pictures of women removed from merchandise labels. Sufi shrines were desecrated and members of the Kakai were forced to convert to Islam or flee, former prisoners of the group also claim that Ansar al-Islam routinely used torture and severe beatings when interrogating prisoners. Beheading of prisoners had also been reported and it resulted in the deaths of a substantial number of militants and the uncovering of a chemical weapons facility at Sargat. Sargat was the facility of its type discovered in Iraq. S. Ansar al-Sunna became a prominent insurgent group active in the so-called Sunni Triangle, carrying out kidnappings, suicide bombings, in December 2007 the Ansar al-Sunna group formally acknowledged being derived from Ansar al-Islam, and reverted to using that name. Ansar al-Islam remained active after the withdrawal of U. S. troops from Iraq of 2011, Attacks against Iraqi security forces have been claimed by the group, particularly around Mosul and Kirkuk
