Opening remarks
“Michael’s point though is absolutely vital. Are the Kurds a nation? They certainly don’t behave as a unified nation, whether in Turkey, whether in Syria, whether in Iraq or in Iran, and our focus today is on Iraq. People often argue that the Kurds suffer from divide and rule strategies. I used to believe that it is true that others seek to divide them. The Kurds internal divisions are almost pathological and make it easy for others to govern them or to prevent them from obtaining their rights. And that’s our subject matter today, the rights of Kurds under Iraq’s constitution.
So if we can briefly recap where we are in the constitution of 2005 Kurdistan achieved remarkable rights, it achieved recognition as an autonomous region, the right to make its own constitution, which it has signally failed to do primarily as a result of disagreements over whether or not Kurdistan should have a president or a parliamentary system dominated by a prime minister. But failure to make a Kurdistan constitution has all sorts of side consequences, including continuing divisions inside the constitution of Iraq, Kurds won remarkable federal arrangements, including the creation of a second chamber and the creation of a federal Supreme court as the world should know, there has been no implementation of either provision. Iraq does not have a federal second chamber. And the Supreme court is not the Supreme court envisaged under Iraq’s constitution. It is a leftover from transitional arrangements. That means for practical purposes right now, Iraq is in an unfinished constitution. There is no genuine federal institutions in the absence of a second chamber and in the absence of an authentic and legitimate Supreme court. So that means we have had roughly 15 years since this constitution was first crafted and ratified with extraordinary support, but it’s continually unfinished in key respects, not only in regard to provisions related to the Kurds. What can be done about that? Well, it is the duty of the president under Iraq’s constitution to protect the constitution. So I would expect to hear a great deal more from Barham Salih, on the full scale implementation of the constitution, all of it, not some particular aspects of it, all of it, that’s his job. That’s his duty as an Iraqi as well as a Kurd, but particularly as an Iraqi, now we heard a short day off to the events of 2017 from the United Nations, that there had been a failure to implement Iraq’s constitution.
Well, that’s putting it mildly. There certainly has. What role might the UN play along with the president in mediating over unsolved issues regarding the constitution. It could in principle play a significant role provided it shows appropriate impartial and professional and competent mediators. That should certainly be explored. I find it remarkably helpful though. I don’t presume that it tells us everything that the new prime minister’s language has not been harsh on any controversial topic. He has tended to say that we should coordinate according to the constitution. Of course, the problem is that people do not agree on what is the constitution about how it should be properly implemented. So progress needs to be made in that area. And I think the initiative lies with the president, and I think the UN’s capacities and available resources are there to be used in ways that could be helpful to all parties.
Now, I’d like to turn my attention briefly to questions that are particularly pertinent to Kurtz that dr. Karim raised, I think it’s unambiguous that constitutionally, Kurdistan won the right to develop its own oil fields, period. You can’t inspect the constitution and question that. It’s also unambiguous that oil and gas are a shared function. It’s also unambiguous that there was a Kurdistan regional government veto over matters related to shared oil and gas production. Those questions are in my view, utterly unambiguous that any impartial reader of the constitution would see that where there is reasonable room for debate, and I don’t say Kurdistan’s position on this question is wrong. But I do admit that there’s room for debate is how exports take place and how they’re managed. Those are practical questions that could in principle be resolved. And I do not think that there’s any evidence that the Kurdistan government has been the prime source of difficulty in this matter, right now there’s a tremendous problem for both the Kurdistan region and for Iraq because of the falling price of oil and gas because of the coronavirus.
Therefore be extraordinary difficult in conditions of scarcity for Kurdistan to achieve what it should be entitled to its proportionate share of Iraq’s shared oil and gas revenues. I assume that the Kurds will be competent in negotiating their position in this respect. And I have no particular bargaining advice to give them. What I do think is critical is the Kurds do not forget their own constitutional obligations. They need to make their own constitution. They do not have to make it in any sense, supportment to every wish that might come from Baghdad. They can do it in full with full exercise of all their powers under direct constitution and in doing so, they could use the Kurdistan constitution making process to overcome many of their fundamental, and those have said already, pathological divisions.”
Should Kurds give the new prime minister a time limit to solve the issues?
“The [Iraqi] prime minister enjoys his position, partly because the largest party in Iraq. This is a strange thing to say, the Kurdistan Democratic Party, the Arab parties are so fragmented and divided that not one of them is bigger than the Kurdistan Democratic Party. So the Kurdish parties did endorse this prime minister and are willing to give him a fair wind. I think issuing express time limits on anybody is usually counter productive. But what I do think should happen is that the president of Iraq, Barham Salih should openly begin a process of constitutional review and implementation. And at the same time, the Kurds can take matters into their own hands and start completing the making of their own constitution. Both of those processes would actually assist the prime minister who wants, he says, I see no reason to immediately disbelieve him, to coordinate according to the constitution. So if we’re going to coordinate according to the constitution, there needs to be some minimal agreement as to what the constitution is, and for there to be dispute resolution procedures to deal with that.”
On the unification of the Peshmerga forces
“The constitutional rights of Kurdistan cannot be modified except through a procedure that requires its consent. And I’m sorry to be a bore about this. If you want a unified Peshmerga, if you want a mechanism to accomplish a unified Peshmerga, the way to do that is through creating a unified Kurdistan through a common constitution of the Kurdistan region. “
Going forward
“I would emphasize that President Nechrvan Barzani and President Barham Salih respectively presidents of the Kurdistan region and Iraq, on June the 20th said that all should be coordinated with respect to the constitution. The prime minister has said the same, and I would emphasize that take people at their word, but make them follow their word. There has to be some mechanism for resolving constitutional disputes and the current Supreme court work. Why not try UN mediation and why not? Why shouldn’t Kurds put extensive pressure on President Salih to fulfill his constitutional obligation, to protect the constitution as a whole in all its parts, not individual components.”
The Turkish incursion
“I think the government of Turkey is incredibly overextended. It’s not only present in Iraq and in Syria, it’s a basic dispute with every single one of its neighbors. It is playing a very strange and erratic game between Russia and NATO in terms of arms supplies and its economy is in dreadful shape and in two is affected by COVID. I think that the Erdogan regime may well be in danger. So we should not assume that the bleakest possible world will follow from current Turkish military aggression. Though Peter’s point about the dangerous for the Syrian Kurds as well taken. A final reminder point about unity, the Kurds are at their most admired globally when they are engaged in combat against jihadists, or when they are resisting an authoritarian regime. They get no sympathy at all when they’re internally. So that’s the first strategic priority of any worthwhile Kurdish states men or women.