Turkish premier warns against ethnic meddling

ANKARA, TURKEY —  The Turkish prime minister on Monday warned Iraqi Kurds against interfering in his country’s southeast, where Turkish Kurds are battling government forces.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was responding to Massoud Barzani, the president of the semiautonomous Kurdish region in Iraq, who said Iraqi Kurds would retaliate for any Turkish interference in northern Iraq by stirring up trouble in southeastern Turkey.

“He’s out of place,” Erdogan said of Barzani. “He’ll be crushed under his words.”

The verbal sparring was set off Saturday when Barzani said in an interview with Al Arabiya television that Iraqi Kurds would “interfere” in Kurdish-majority Turkish cities if Ankara intervened in northern Iraq.

The remark touched a nerve in Turkey, where more than 37,000 people have been killed in fighting between Turkish security forces and Kurdish rebels since 1984, most of them in the southeastern region bordering Iraq. Turkey fears that any moves toward greater independence for Kurds in northern Iraq could incite the bulk of its own estimated 14 million Kurds to rebellion.

Turkey is especially concerned about Barzani’s bid to incorporate the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk into his region, fearing that Iraqi Kurds would use revenue from the city’s oil wealth to fund a bid for independence.

“Northern Iraq, which is a neighbor, is making a serious mistake: The price for them will be very high,” Erdogan warned.

The Foreign Ministry also sent a note to the Iraqi government “reminding them of their responsibilities on the subject of the fight against terror,” Turkish government spokesman Cemil Cicek said.

“The source of the ethnic terrorism that is taking lives in Turkey is Iraq,” he said in a news conference, referring to Kurdish rebels from Turkey who hide and train in the mountainous region of northern Iraq.

Later in the day, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, an ethnic Kurd, called Erdogan to allay his concerns, saying he was saddened by the rising tensions with Ankara, Turkey’s state-run Anatolian news agency reported.

Last week, the Iraqi government decided to implement a constitutional requirement to determine the status of Kirkuk, which is claimed by several ethnic groups, by year’s end. The plan is expected to turn Kirkuk and its vast oil reserves over to Kurdish control, a step rejected by many of Iraq’s Arabs as well as by its ethnic Turkmens, who are backed by the Turkish government.

Some in Turkey have hinted at military action to prevent the Kurds from gaining control of Kirkuk.

Turkish opposition parties criticized the government for not responding harshly to the Iraqi Kurdish leader’s threat.

Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul called U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Saturday to discuss Barzani’s remarks, Anatolian reported.

Kursad Tuzmen, the Turkish minister responsible for foreign trade, said earlier Monday: “Turkey’s hand of friendship is warm and solid. But for those who don’t deserve it, it is very heavy -- it should never be tested.”

In the interview with Al Arabiya on Saturday, Barzani said, “Turkey is not allowed to intervene in the Kirkuk issue and if it does, we will interfere in Diyarbakir’s issues and other cities in Turkey.” Diyarbakir is the largest city in Turkey’s Kurdish-dominated southeast.

When asked about the Turkmen minority in Kirkuk and Turkey’s concern for its ethnic brethren, Barzani shot back:

“There are 30 million Kurds in Turkey and we don’t interfere there. If [the Turks] interfere in Kirkuk over just thousands of Turkmen, then we will take action for the 30 million Kurds in Turkey.”