NORTHERN IRAQ: TURKMEN FRONT TO BOYCOTT OPPOSITION

C O N F I D E N T I A L ANKARA 008142 SIPDIS STATE FOR NEA CROCKER, NEA/NGA AND EUR/SE; LONDON FOR GOLDRICH; DAMASCUS FOR WALKER E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/11/2012 TAGS: PREL MARR TU IZ SUBJECT: NORTHERN IRAQ: TURKMEN FRONT TO BOYCOTT OPPOSITION CONFERENCE UNLESS 4 KDP-FRIENDLY TURKMEN ARE BLACK-LISTED REF: A. ANKARA 7775 ¶B. ANKARA 7550 ¶C. ANKARA 7509 ¶D. ANKARA 7148 (U) Classified by Pol-Mil Counselor Stuart Brown. Reasons: 1.5 (B and D). ¶1. (C) Operation Northern Watch POLAD met with Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF) Ankara rep and Executive Committee member Dr. Mustafa Ziya November 12. Ziya said that although the opposition conference steering committee had increased the number of Turkmen seats, the total number of seats had also been increased. The Turkmen, Ziya said, still end up with only 6 percent. He complained that at the 1999 New York meeting the ITF got all of the Turkmen seats, but for the Brussels conference 2 percent were being given to Turkmen Islamists, 2 percent to KDP-friendly Turkmen and only 2 percent to the ITF. Ziya said that the ITF wanted to participate, but would not do so unless the situation were fixed. He said that the ITF could live with 6 percent of the seats, and even with sharing those with the Turkmen Islamists. However, the ITF would not participate if the KDP-friendly Turkmen were attending. -------------- Dr. Ziya Names Names -------------- ¶2. (C) Ziya said that the Turkmen the ITF objected to are: Walid Sharika, Turkmen Brotherhood Party; Saifat din Damerji, Turkmen Union Party; Jawdat Najar, Kurdistan Turkmen Cultural Association and minister in the Kurdistan Regional Government; and Shirzat Oza'iri, Democratic Turkmen Party of Kurdistan. Ziya alleged that Sharika and Oza'iri were not really Turkmen at all and worked for KDP intel services, and that Oza'iri and din Damerji participated in the GOI's Anfal campaign against the Kurds. All these individuals and their groups had, Ziya said, at most a few dozen supporters (the ITF, he said was "a thousand times" bigger) and received their salaries from the KDP. It was, he said, impossible for the ITF to agree to sit with them as part of the Turkmen delegation to the conference. Ziya said these four individuals really represented the KDP, and that the KDP was using its position on the steering committee to "stack the deck" in its favor at the conference. He urged the US to press the KDP to get these individuals removed from the invitation list. -------------- ITF Seeks USG Intervention to Reign-in KDP -------------- ¶3. (C) Ziya said the ITF's impression was that the Iraqi Kurds and Shi'a were controlling the steering committee. It would, he said, be useful for the USG to discuss the conference problems with the "group of nine" (the steering committee plus the ITF and Assyrians - we are unsure who number 9 is). Ziya said the ITF rep in London would be meeting with Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmed Chalabi to discuss the conference, but would be in a listening mode and would not try to form an alliance. ¶4. (C) Ziya also told us that per Ref A, the ITF had decided to appoint him ITF representative responsible for external relations. An official announcement will be made November ¶16. PEARSON