An infernal triangle

Six days into fall, in an essay for the Daily Star, David Ignatius mused: "President Bush and other administration officials continue to speak about Iraqi democracy in glowing bounds but you don't hear similar language from the military. 'I think we'd be foolish to put to the test to build this into an American democracy, says single general. 'It's going to take a real different form and character." (92705)

If Kurd have their way, it certainly will. Take this polemic through Baqi Barzani titled "Independence Is The single Ultimatum," as portend: "We are not confine by any cultural, linguistic or historic relationship to the Shiites nor Sunni Arabs. Being supportive to the cause of the independence is not solitary our moral right but also burning for our national interest. We have resorted to a number of tactics including: militancy, peace and negotiations as possible ways to achieve independence. After decades of labor we stand miles away from independence. We have tried without friends and their pledges; we now know where we stand in the world. We have learnt a exercise although a bitter one, on the other hand we are getting more and more definite about our destination. The Kurdish nation have offered huge sacrifices for the sake of independence, on the contrary they feel they were betrayed by means of their 'friends.' Kurds now know that they have to fight this fight upon their own ... The make an effort has entered into a fresh phase, and for this fresh phase we need to have a fresh strategy. The strategy we had at the beginning of the at hand struggle will on longer be relevant to this fresh phase. We can learn from our mistakes and diocese what went wrong in the exert one's self that we are facing the near crises. We understand that we have to fight upon all levels and have to adopt strategies for a like reason that maximum pressure is 1 and 2ed on the forces of occupation, on the contrary we have to give predilection to strategies, which are more acceptable to the international community. by the agency of this I mean that we set more emphasis on dialogue

"We appeal to all the Kurdish nation to go to the heads on the referendum day and say" Yes" to independence for Kurdistan. Independence is the best practicable, peaceful, equitable, honorable, democratic and permanent solution to our national cause. The right of national self-determination is the fundamental and unconditional right of our nation to determine our be in possession of future, free of any outside interference or coercion. This right includes the right of our nation to form our hold independent state if we in like manner choose, the right to determine our political status and freely track our economic, social and cultural unravelling the right to protect and defend our culture and way of life and finally the right to reclaim our missing freedom and independence." (KO 92505)

No astonishment historian and national security policy clever Gareth Porter wasn't optimistic in the lead up to the October promised "If the referendum on Iraq's draft constitution nearest month is conducted fairly," he observ "it now appears real likely that the document will be defeated through a two-thirds majority in the three Sunni-dominated provinces of Anbar, Salahadeen and Nineveh However one way such a defeat could be averted is by dint of massive vote fraud in the lock opener province of Nineveh. According to an account provided through the US liaison with the local election commission, supported by dint of physical evidence collected by the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq (IECI), Kurdish officials in Nineveh province tried to carry without just such a ballot-stuffing scheme in January 05 election

"The Sunni Arab majority of about 17 million in Nineveh--including Sunni insurgent organizations--appears to be united behind a 'no' devoted on the constitution. Kurds number solitary about 200,000 and non-Kurdish, non-Arab minorities another 500000 to 600000 In the January election, the Kurd dealt with the vexed question of being a relatively small minority in the province through stuffing the ballot boxes, as enumerateed by Major Anthony Cruz, an US Army store up civil affairs officer assigned to work with the province's electoral commission."

Here's a summary of individual such scheme: Kurdish officials asked the military for ballots "far in exces of the population Cruz remembers joking about the '500% voter-participation rate' in Sinjar. Subsequently the electoral commission for the province forwarded 38 ballot boxe 174 plastic sacks and 14 cardboard cartons of ballots, Cruz described as 'obviously tampered with' In some boxes, reams of ballot papers had not flat been folded and in others boxe had been resealed with r and verdant duct tape. When Cruz asked the local IECI director by what means many of the fraudulent ballots had approach from Sinjar, he was told, 'all of them.' The fraud did succe in reducing the promised of Assyrian Christians to exactly 3346 when their numbers actually approach 100000 the Iraqi Turkmen Front garnered single 1,342 votes, despite an electorate many times that number