Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
02ANKARA7775
2002-11-04 11:41:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Ankara
Cable title:  

NORTHERN IRAQ: TURKMEN FRONT UNHAPPY WITH

Tags:  PREL MARR TU IZ 
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This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ANKARA 007775 

SIPDIS


STATE FOR NEA CROCKER, NEA/NGA AND EUR/SE;
OSD FOR HRHODE;
LONDON FOR GOLDRICH;
DAMASCUS FOR WALKER


E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/03/2012
TAGS: PREL MARR TU IZ
SUBJECT: NORTHERN IRAQ: TURKMEN FRONT UNHAPPY WITH
OPPOSITION CONFERENCE PLANS, ACKNOWLEDGES MISTAKE IN
EQUATING BARZANI WITH SADDAM

REF: A. ANKARA 7550

B. ANKARA 7509

C. ANKARA 7148


(u) Classified by DCM Robert Deutsch. Reasons: 1.5 (B and
D).


-------------------
Summary and Comment
-------------------


C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ANKARA 007775

SIPDIS


STATE FOR NEA CROCKER, NEA/NGA AND EUR/SE;
OSD FOR HRHODE;
LONDON FOR GOLDRICH;
DAMASCUS FOR WALKER


E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/03/2012
TAGS: PREL MARR TU IZ
SUBJECT: NORTHERN IRAQ: TURKMEN FRONT UNHAPPY WITH
OPPOSITION CONFERENCE PLANS, ACKNOWLEDGES MISTAKE IN
EQUATING BARZANI WITH SADDAM

REF: A. ANKARA 7550

B. ANKARA 7509

C. ANKARA 7148


(u) Classified by DCM Robert Deutsch. Reasons: 1.5 (B and
D).


--------------
Summary and Comment
--------------



1. (C) Operation Northern Watch POLAD met with Iraqi Turkmen
Front (ITF) Ankara rep and Executive Committee member Dr.
Mustafa Ziya November 1. Ziya complained the ITF wanted to
be in the opposition conference steering committee and have
ten percent of the seats at the conference, but a Kurdistan
Democratic Party (KDP) veto was preventing this. He also
objected to the KDP filling Turkmen conference slots with
pro-KDP Turkmen who were ITF opponents and asked for USG help
in turning the KDP around on these issues. Ziya acknowledged
that hostile Turkmen rhetoric directed against KDP leader
Masoud Barzani was unhelpful and painted the ITF as
anti-Barzani, but not necessarily anti-Baghdad. He hoped to
control the message better by getting himself appointed as
the ITF rep responsible for external relations and press.
End Summary.



2. (C) Comment: The good news is that Ziya knows the ITF was
out of line by letting some of its people use the "Barzani
equals Saddam" slogan in the Turkish election campaign. They
apparently just couldn't help themselves and the Turkish
press was clamoring for such stuff. Hopefully, Ziya will be
able to exercise more control over ITF public statements now
that Turkish elections are behind us, especially if he gets
designated as the ITF's official spokesman. The Assyrian
example of convening all major Assyrian groups in London to
decide for themselves how to apportion the Assyrian seats at
the opposition conference strikes us as the best recipe to
resolve the issue of individual Turkmen representation. We
believe Washington should encourage the Turkmen to convene
such a meeting in London in the near future to avoid bitter
disagreements that are bound to draw Turkey into the fray and
that could poison the conference's outcome. As things

currently stand, Barzani will not discard the Turkmen who
have stood by him, and the ITF will not sit at a table where
those Turkmen are present. We expect Turkey to press hard on
behalf of the ITF position. End comment.


--------------
ITF Pushes "Conditions" for Opposition Conf.
--------------



3. (C) On November 1, ONW POLAD met ITF Ankara rep Dr.
Mustafa Ziya to discuss the opposition conference and ITF-KDP
relations. Ziya had been in London in mid-October for
meetings with the opposition conference steering committee.
He said the ITF had three conditions: 1) ITF wanted to be in
the steering committee; 2) ITF wanted to have a rep in each
subcommittee; and 3) ITF wanted at least 10% Turkmen
representation at the conference. Ziya claimed that five of
the steering committee members he saw separately in London
agreed to these conditions, but when the committee met as a
group the KDP, whose reps had refused to see him in London,
vetoed the changes. The committee then told Ziya that the
ITF had to accept the committee's decision. Ziya told the
committee that if the percentage of representation could not
be changed, every group, rather than every individual, should
have one vote. This, he said, would solve many problems for
many groups. The ITF Executive Committee is writing a letter
to the steering committee complaining about the status of
arrangements (Ziya said ITF would provide a copy to Embassy
Ankara and NEA/NGA). Ziya also objected to the KDP filling
limited Turkmen slots at the conference with non-ITF, pro-KDP
Turkmen. Ziya told us the ITF needs the USG's help in
getting the KDP to back down on these points.

4. (C) Ziya said that while he was in London, Iraqi National
Congress (INC) leader Ahmed Chalabi had called the INC office
from the US and told the INC staff to prepare for an INC
General Assembly. It was unclear to Ziya when and where this
might take place and who might provide the Assembly's
funding.
-------------- --------------
Ziya Will Try to Stop "Barzani is Like Saddam" Rhetoric
-------------- --------------



5. (C) We showed Ziya a Turkish Daily News article from
10/22 (faxed to NEA/NGA) reporting an Iraqi Turkman
demonstration in Istanbul where people chanted "death to
Barzani, the enemy of Turkey" and held placards showing
Barzani, Talabani and Saddam supported by the US trampling on
the Iraqi Turkmen. We told him this did not help the cause
of trying to get the Turkmen a seat at the serious table of
Iraqi opposition, and added that the ITF's recent press
statements sounded like they were mainly anti-Barzani, not
anti-Baghdad. He acknowledged the problem and hoped it would
disappear after the Turkish election campaign. Ziya said the
TDN article was written by a man in Ireland who knows nothing
about the real situation, and that the ITF had nothing to do
with either the article (which calls the Turkmen of Iraq
loyal to the Iraqi government) or the Istanbul demonstration.
In fact, Ziya related, he had told Turkish TV that such
demonstrations were dangerous and would be used by the other
parties inside northern Iraq against the Turkmen. Ziya told
us that while the crowd at the demonstration contained only a
few dozen Iraqi Turkmen, it was organized and attended by a
few hundred Turkish MHP activists. "It was done for the
Turkish election campaign," he said.



6. (C) Ziya insisted his public line has consistently been
that the ITF had problems with the KDP, but that these could
be solved via negotiations, which he hoped could start with
the visit to northern Iraq of a Turkish MFA delegation in the
near future. He told us that he had recently proposed to the
ITF Executive Committee appointing him the sole point of
contact with the media/external relations chief (something
like the KDP's Hoshyar Zebari or the Patriotic Union of
Kurdistan's Sade Piri, he said). He said he would try to
stop the "Barzani is as bad as Saddam" rhetoric coming out of
some of the ITF's constituent ranks (including some
Turkey-based leaders). Ziya said he understood that outside
of Turkey such talk only hurts the ITF. He expected a
decision on the creation of the new position within a few
weeks, and said he would in any case press the ITF
constituent organizations to stop the harmful rhetoric.


-------------- --------------
Ziya Explains Why ITF Didn't Attend Joint Assembly
-------------- --------------



7. (C) We asked Ziya why the ITF did not attend the October 4
and 7 joint assembly sessions in Irbil and Sulaymaniyah,
after the GOT and we had weighed in hard to get the Turkmen
Front invited. Ziya replied that ITF Chairman Sannan Aga
told him the invitation came late the night before the first
session, was not "official," and that all Iraqi Turkmen would
have opposed him if he had attended. Ziya added that the ITF
had a problem in principle with the other Turkmen who
attended the sessions (those who work with Barzani in the
regional administration). We told Ziya that, in our view,
the ITF's decision not to attend the assembly sessions
represented missed opportunities. Ziya then said that the
ITF wanted to meet with the KDP to work things out but that
the KDP consistently refused to sit with ITF leaders. He was
confident that the KDP-ITF problems could be solved in a
matter of weeks and that they need a period of media truce.
PEARSON