Notes
1 Erica Gaston acted as editor for this piece and contributed analysis to this report. Hana Nasser provided research support.
2 Based on its interviews and research, in 2006 the International Crisis Group estimated that Kirkuk city had a population of 800,000 out of 1.5 million in the governorate. International Crisis Group, Iraq and the Kurds: The Brewing Battle over Kirkuk (Amman/Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2006), https://d2071andvip0wj.cloudfront.net/56-iraq-and-the-kurds-the-brewing-battle-over-kirkuk.pdf. A report by the NGO NCCI, based on the official 2007 Iraqi government data, estimated Kirkuk city’s population was 572,080, and that the total population was 902,019. NGO Coordination Committee for Iraq, “Kirkuk: NCCI Governorate Profile,” Date unknown, 1, www.ncciraq.org/images/infobygov/NCCI_Kirkuk_Governorate_Profile.pdf.
3 Figures from the 1957 census. Liam Anderson and Gareth Stansfield, Crisis in Kirkuk: The Ethnopolitics of Conflict and Compromise (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009), 43. International Crisis Group noted that “In 1957, before Arabisation, census figures – considered reliable – suggested that Kurds were a plurality in the governorate, though not in Kirkuk town, where Turkomans predominated.” International Crisis Group, Iraq and the Kurds, 2.
4 Mirella Galletti, “Kirkuk: The Pivot of Balance in Iraq Past and Present,” Journal of Assyrian Academic Studies 19, no.2 (2005): 22 – 52, http://www.jaas.org/edocs/v19n2/Galetti.pdf.
5 George Black, Genocide in Iraq: The Anfal Campaign against the Kurds (New York: Human Rights Watch, 1993), https://www.hrw.org/reports/1993/iraqanfal.
6 According to Human Rights Watch investigations in Kirkuk and other governorates with significant Kurdish populations, the Anfal campaign, and pre-cursor attacks in 1987, resulted in: “mass summary executions and mass disappearance of many tens of thousands of non-combatants, including … sometimes the entire population of villages;” “the widespread use of chemical weapons, including mustard gas and the nerve agent GB, or Sarin, against the town of Halabja as well as dozens of Kurdish villages, killing many thousands of people, mainly women and children;” “the wholesale destruction of some 2,000 villages, which are described in government documents as having been ‘burned,’ ‘destroyed,’ ‘demolished’ and ‘purified’;” “arbitrary jailing and warehousing for months, in conditions of extreme deprivation, of tens of thousands of women, children and elderly people, without judicial order or any cause other than their presumed sympathies for the Kurdish opposition. Many hundreds of them were allowed to die of malnutrition and disease;” “forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of villagers upon the demolition of their homes.” George Black, Genocide in Iraq: The Anfal Campaign against the Kurds.
7 Sean Kane notes that “with the exception of nine days — March 19 to 28 — during the 1991 uprising, Kirkuk has never been Kurdish administered in modern Iraqi history.” He noted that this remained “nominally true after 2003,” – PUK peshmerga and police units helped take control of the city, they were then asked to withdraw and the U.S. military took control. However, “the Arab boycott of the political process from 2003 to 2007 and the close military relationship between the U.S. and Kurdish security services[…] allowed the Kurdish political parties to establish control over many public institutions in the province, including capturing twenty-six of the forty-one seats on the provincial council during the January 2005 provincial elections.” Sean Kane, Iraq’s Disputed Territories, United States Institute of Peace, April 4, 2011, 23, https://www.usip.org/publications/2011/04/iraqs-disputed-territories. See also International Crisis Group, Iraq and the Kurds, 8 – 12.
8 Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution provides, “First: The executive authority shall undertake the necessary steps to complete the implementation of the requirements of all subparagraphs of Article 58 of the Transitional Administrative Law. Second: The responsibility placed upon the executive branch of the Iraqi Transitional Government stipulated in Article 58 of the Transitional Administrative Law shall extend and continue to the executive authority elected in accordance with this Constitution, provided that it accomplishes completely (normalization and census and concludes with a referendum in Kirkuk and other disputed territories to determine the will of their citizens), by a date not to exceed the 31st of December 2007.” Iraq Const. Art. 140. International Crisis Group notes the influence of Kurdish leaders in promoting this provision: “Their two leaders, Masoud Barzani and Jalal Talabani, used their positions on the 25-member interim governing Council (July 2003 to June 2004) to influence the drafting of the interim constitution, the Transitional Administrative Law (TAL), in early 2004, including Article 58, which prescribed a reversal of Arabisation […].” International Crisis Group, Iraq and the Kurds, 7.
9 2005 Iraqi Constitution.
10 Sean Kane, Iraq’s Disputed Territories, 23. International Crisis Group, Iraq and the Kurds.
11 Ibid.
12 Michael Knights and Ahmed Ali, Kirkuk in Transition. Confidence Building in Northern Iraq (Washington, DC: The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 2010), 28, http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/uploads/Documents/pubs/PolicyFocus102.pdf.
13 Ibid.
14 Shalaw Mohammed, “Kirkuk Governor: ‘Life in the City May Never Be Normal’,” NIQASH, May 16, 2013, http://www.niqash.org/en/articles/security/3221; Knights and Ali, Kirkuk in Transition. The Kirkuk police also established two SWAT-like paramilitary units (emergency support units) to undertake counter-insurgency tasks that the Federal Police would normally assume in other governorates.
15 International Crisis Group, Iraq and the Kurds: Confronting Withdrawal Fears (Erbil/Baghdad/Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2011), https://d2071andvip0wj.cloudfront.net/103-iraq-and-the-kurds-confronting-withdrawal-fears.pdf.
16 Mohammed, “Kirkuk Governor”; Shalaw Mohammed, “New Command Centre in Kirkuk Threatens Peace,” NIQASH, October 4, 2012, http://www.niqash.org/en/articles/security/3135.
17 The Kirkuk governor ordered digging these ditches in 2013 to prevent the entry of vehicle-bound IEDs and protect its residents. However, Arabs and Turkmens viewed this plan with suspicion and accused the governor of conspiring to join the city to the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. The semi-circular, 2‑meter-wide, and 3‑meter-deep trench runs for 52 kilometers and embraces the city from the south while leaving its northern part open toward the Kurdistan Region. The trench features several watchtowers, and its construction cost about 3 million. Shalaw Mohammed, “Kirkuk Builds a Moat: Taking a Medieval Tack against Terrorists,” NIQASH, July 25, 2013, http://www.niqash.org/en/articles/security/3257. A year later, KDP-led authorities began digging another trench separating Erbil from Kirkuk governorate, which sparked opposition from all parties in Kirkuk. Shalaw Mohammed, “Ethnic Barriers Security Trench between Erbil and Kirkuk Inflames Tensions,” NIQASH, May 8, 2014, http://www.niqash.org/en/articles/security/3438/security-trench-between-erbil-and-kirkuk-inflames-tensions.htm.
18 Population estimates by the World Food Programme (2007). IAU and OCHA, Kirkuk Governorate Profile (New York and Geneva: Inter-Agency Information and Analysis Unit and United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 2009), http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/8E402B7CD21D076AC12576120034C81A-Full_Report.pdf.
19 Population estimates based on 2008 National ID records.
20 International Organization for Migration, Integrated Location Assessment: Thematic Overview and Governorates Profiles (Baghdad: International Organization for Migration (Iraq Mission), 2017), 33.
21 KDP expansion into Kirkuk’s oil infrastructure was significant. On July 11, KDP-affiliated forces expelled the North Oil Company, a Baghdad-affiliated company, from the Avana dome (of the Kirkuk oil field) and the Bai Hassan oil field, and the KRG contracted the KAR Group, a private company close to the KDP, to operate the facilities. (The KRG has controlled the Khurmala dome of the Kirkuk oil field since 2008). “Iraq: Kurdish Options Limited in Northern Oil Fields,” Stratfor, July 11, 2014, https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/iraq-kurdish-options-limited-northern-oil-fields. Since early 2014, Kirkuk’s oil has flown through a pipeline controlled by the KRG, because Sunni insurgents had destroyed the main Iraq-Turkey pipeline and has threatened any engineers sent to fix it. David Sheppard, “With New Grip on Oil Fields, Iraq Kurds Unveil Plan to Ramp up Exports,” Reuters, June 25, 2014, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-security-kurds-oil-idUSKBN0F02KL20140625.
22 Kamaran al-Najar, Mohammed Hussein, Staff of Iraq Oil Report “Kirkuk oil crisis subsides as PUK faction withdraws,” Iraq Oil Report, March 10, 2017, http://www.iraqoilreport.com/news/kirkuk-oil-crisis-subsides-puk-faction-withdraws-21551.
23 “Daesh Controls the Building of the Forum and the Police Station West of Kirkuk,” Al Mada Press, June 16, 2014.
24 Abigail Hauslohner, “Shiite Villagers Describe ‘Massacre’ in Northern Iraq,” Washington Post, June 23, 2014, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/shiite-villagers-describe-massacre-in-northern-iraq/2014/06/23/278b0fb2-76c8-4796 – 83f7-840c277e93d8_story.html?utm_term=.6f65d8a53200.
25 Neil Shea, “Kurds Fight to Preserve ‘the Other Iraq’,” National Geographic, March 2016, http://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2016/03/kurds-northern-iraq-kurdistan-peshmerga-isis/.
26 A Daily Sabah news article at the time cites Kirkuk Governor Najmaldin Karim as welcoming the PMF, but KRG President Masoud Barzani noted that they would not be allowed in Kirkuk city. “Shiite Badr Brigades Clashes with ISIS in Kirkuk,” Daily Sabah, June 29, 2014, https://www.dailysabah.com/mideast/2014/06/29/shiite-badr-brigades-clashes-with-isis-in-kirkuk.
27 Shea, “Kurds Fight to Preserve.”
28 Ibid.; Vivian Salama, “Iraq Shiite Militias Rush to Defend Kirkuk from ISIL,” The National, February 17, 2016, https://www.thenational.ae/world/mena/iraq-shiite-militias-rush-to-defend-kirkuk-from-isil.
29 Abdul Aziz al-Taei, “Power-Sharing Agreement between Shia Militias and Kurds in Kirkuk,” Al Araby, February 22, 2015, https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/news/2015/2/22/power-sharing-agreement-between-shia-militias-and-kurds-in-kirkuk; “Amiri from Kirkuk: the Next Press Conference Will Be in Hawija and Charges against the Hashd Are Invalid,” Al Sumaria, February 8, 2015.
30 Campbell MacDiarmid, “Inside Taza, the Iraqi Town Gassed by the Islamic State,” Vice News, March 16, 2016, https://news.vice.com/article/inside-taza-the-iraqi-town-gassed-by-isis-with-chemical-rockets.
31 This force was established in June 2015, mostly from (university) students in Iraq’s Babel governorate. “Establishment of Sons of Karrar Regiment from Babel’s Residents and Students to Face ISIL,” Al Sumaria, June 14, 2015.
32 “Video: ISIL targeting the Hashd with Toxic Gases,” Al Alam, May 3, 2016, http://www.alalam.ir/news/1814466.
33 Al Jazeera Arabic, “Is the Kurdish Trench Paving the Way for the Division of Iraq?” YouTube video, 3:22, July 28, 2013, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a02PzXkfCz4; “‘Trench of Kurdistan’ between the Motives of the Policy and Security Requirements,” Al Jazeera, June 3, 2016.
34 Tim Arango, “ISIS Fighters in Iraq Attack Kirkuk, Diverting Attention from Mosul,” New York Times¸ October 21, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/22/world/middleeast/iraq-kirkuk.html.
35 For a projection of different security scenarios, see Humanitarian Foresight Think Tank, Iraq 2018 Scenarios. Planning After Mosul (Paris: Institute de Relations Internationales et Stratégiques, 2017), http://www.iris-france.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Obs-ProspHuma-Iraq-july-2017.pdf.
36 Samuel Morris, Khogir Wirya, and Dlawer Ala’Aldeen, The Future of Kirkuk: A Roadmap for Resolving the Status of the Governorate (Erbil: Middle East Research Institute, 2015), http://www.meri‑k.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/The-Future-of-Kirkuk-A-Roadmap-for-Resolving-the-Status-of-the-Province-English.pdf.
37 “Yaychi Local Council Denies the Formation of a Turkmen Force in Kirkuk,” NRT, July 18, 2017, http://www.nrttv.com/Ar/Detail.aspx?Jimare=52640.
38 Editorial Staff, “Turkey to Arm Turkmen Forces in Iraq’s Kirkuk, after Military Training,” Ekurd Daily, July 17, 2017, http://ekurd.net/turkey-arm-turkmen-kirkuk-2017 – 07-17.
39 The Kakai Battalion, also known as Yarsan or Ahal al-Haqq, has been caught in the middle of PUK and KDP infighting, with both political parties vying for control of the militia. Saad Salloum, “Iraq’s Kakai Minority Joins Fight against Islamic State,” Al Monitor, September 22, 2015, http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/09/iraq-kakai-religious-beliefs-armed-force-isis.html. At least one of the Battalion’s three regiments operates in Daquq district (headquartered in Tal Hamma area, close to the Kakai-majority Arab Koi village on the frontlines with ISIL). Mohammed A. Salih and Wladimir van Wilgenburg, “Iraq’s Kakais: ‘We Want to Protect Our Culture’,” Al Jazeera, February 11, 2015, http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/02/iraq-kakais-protect-culture-150209064856695.html.
40 The group calls itself the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons. It is linked with the military arm of the Kurdistan Democratic Party. The group is led by Hussayn Yazdan Bina, and it is not the same as the homonymous PKK-splinter group based in Turkey, which the US designated as a terrorist group in 2008. Shalaw Mohammed, “Ragtag Kurdish Forces Face ISIL assaults at ‘The Kobani of Iraq’,” Informed Comment: Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion, January 23, 2015, https://www.juancole.com/2015/01/kurdish-assaults-kobani.html; “Kurdish Sources: Tehran Wants an Excuse for the ‘Hashd’ to Attack the City to Disrupt the Referendum on Independence,” Asharq al Awsat, June 24, 2017.
41 Kurdistan Regional Government, “KRG Statement on Recent Events at Oil Facilities and Infrastructure in Makhmour District,” Press release, Ministry of Natural Resources. July 11, 2014, http://mnr.krg.org/index.php/en/press-releases/394-krg-statement-on-recent-events-at-oil-facilities-and-infrastructure-in-makhmour-district.
42 “Kirkuk Oil Flows in Jeopardy Again as Kurdish Tensions Grow,” Reuters, March 3, 2017, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-oil-kirkuk-turkey-idUSKBN16A1EF.
43 Kamaran al-Najar, Mohammed Hussein, Staff of Iraq Oil Report, “Kirkuk oil crisis subsides as PUK faction withdraws.”
44 Ibid.
45 This parallels patterns in Salah ad-Din’s Tuz district. For more see the summary research profile on Tuz.
46 Although the foreign instructors left the base after graduating the first class, there were reports in February 2016 of three military camps operated by Iranian officers in Kirkuk. Vivian Salama and Bram Janssen, “Tensions are Rising between Kurds and Shia Militias in Iraq,” Business Insider, February 17, 2015, http://www.businessinsider.com/tensions-are-rising-between-kurds-and-shia-militias-in-iraq-2015 – 2?IR=T.
47 Although this was the only base confirmed by this research, a Saudi newspaper reported of additional camps with links to Iran. Dalshad Abdullah, “Six Iranian Military Camps South of Kirkuk… Others on the Way,” Asharq al Awsat, August 22, 2016, https://english.aawsat.com/d‑abdullah/news-middle-east/six-iranian-military-camps-south-kirkuk-others-way.
48 The northern front is under the command of Yilmaz an-Najjar, commonly known as Abu Ridha an-Najjar, who is deputy minister of municipalities. Shalaw Mohammed, “Interview + Kirkuk Militia Spokesperson: ‘We Are Proud to Be Supported by Iran’,” NIQASH, July 4, 2017, http://www.niqash.org/en/articles/security/5629/.
49 This area includes Daquq district, Amerli and Suleiman Bek (in Tuz district). Another force, Brigade 16, operates in Tuz Khurmatu city.
50 Each regiment is named after the recruits’ areas of origin: Bashir Regiment, Taza Regiment, Taza Martyrs’ Regiment, Daquq Regiment, al-Qa’im Regiment, and Regiment 90 (“90” is an historic neighborhood in Kirkuk city). The commander of Brigade 16 is Nabeel Issa (nom de guerre: Abu Tha’ir al-Bashiri) from Bashir village.
51 The Martyr Sadr Regiment is a Shi’a Turkmen force under PMF Brigade 15; it was established by the Kirkuk office of the Islamic Da’wa Party (the largest political party in Iraq that has been the source of all prime ministers since 2006). The Haqq Regiment is composed of Sunni Turkmens; it was established by Turhan al-Mufti, an advisor to the prime minister on Turkmen affairs and head of the Turkmen Haqq Party.
52 Although it was not possible for researchers to visit the Arab villages, locals claimed that every force that took part in the operation to retake Bashir is still present in the area as a holding force, including Shi’a Arab forces, although parts of each force has been re-deployed to other governorates or areas of PMF operations.
53 See, for example, Wasfi al-Assi explain to his fighters that they are part of al-hashd al-shaabi, which many accuse of violating the rights of Sunni Arabs. Qasim Jabar, “Sheikh Wasfi al-Assi Talks to Ubayd Tribal Fighters who volunteered with the Hashd,” YouTube video, 1:51, March 12, 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFzIdanwSSE; see also Hadi al-Ameri’s visit to the Sunni Hashd: The Hashd — Southwest Kirkuk, Facebook post. April 9, 2017, accessed August 15, 2017, https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=183108662090223&id=134231490311274.
54 Al Sumaria, “Hawija Hashd: The East Tigris Joint Operations Command Prepares a Plan to Liberate the District,” December 9, 2016.
55 “Sheikh Wasfi Al-Assi Al-Ubaidi Oversees Volunteering for Hawija Hashd in the al-Alam Area,” YouTube video, 2:48, September 16, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJx85HVvOHw.
56 “Nu’aym Chieftain Calls on the Government to Arm the Tribes and Include their Fighters in the Liberation of Kirkuk,” Al Mada Press, July 10, 2016.
57 In a recent meeting in July 2017, the PMF’s commander at the “northern front,” Yilmaz an-Najjar, committed to training and equipping the group to prepare them for the Hawija operation. “Arabs of Kirkuk Demand the Popular Hashd to Include Their Volunteers in the Battle of Hawija,” NRT TV, July 2017, http://www.nrttv.com/AR/Detail.aspx?Jimare=51210.
58 Two units of the Free Iraq Brigade (liwa’ ahrar al-‘iraq) have been based in Jadida village since early 2016 – one of the Arab villages recently recaptured close to Bashir (Taza sub-district).
59 The Free Iraq Division was formally established in 2014 by the Iraqi Fatwa Office, a Sunni religious institution led by Mufti Mahdi bin Ahmed al-Sumayda’i, as part of the popular mobilization against ISIL. “His Eminence the Mufti of the Republic of Iraq Meets the Representative of His Eminence in the Province of Basra,” Iraq Fatwa House, August 14, 2017, http://www.h‑iftaa.com/.
60 See also, “The Formation of a Second Brigade of the (…) Free Iraq Brigade in Kirkuk,” Rudaw, August 10, 2017, http://www.rudaw.net/arabic/kurdistan/100820179.
61 Dexter Filkins, “The Fight of Their Lives,” The New Yorker, September 29, 2014, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/09/29/fight-lives.
62 HRW observed more than 60 villages that appeared to be partially or totally destroyed via satellite imagery (see the map “Building Demolitions in Villages, Kirkuk Governorate”). HRW further corroborated the destruction of 17 of these sites through witness testimony and site visits, which are described in Human Rights Watch, Marked with an “X”: Iraqi Kurdish Forces’ Destruction of Villages, Homes in Conflict with ISIS (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2016), https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/11/13/marked‑x/iraqi-kurdish-forces-destruction-villages-homes-conflict-isis.
63 Joost Hiltermann, “Iraq: The Battle to Come,” The New York Review of Books, July 1, 2017, http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2017/07/01/iraq-the-battle-to-come/.
64 HRW, Marked with an “X.”
65 Ibid.
66 Amnesty International, ‘Where Are We Supposed to Go?’ Destruction and Forced Displacement in Kirkuk (London: Amnesty International, 2016), https://www.amnestyusa.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/kirkuk_briefing.pdf.
67 HRW, Marked with an “X.”
68 Tim Arango, “ISIS Fighters in Iraq Attack Kirkuk, Diverting Attention from Mosul.”
69 Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch report that hundreds of IDP families were evicted from Wahed Huzairan (June First) and other Arab-majority and mixed-ethnicity neighborhoods of Kirkuk city in a matter of days after the Asayish issued a verbal warning and confiscated identity cards, which would only be returned if the families left Kirkuk. Amnesty International, Where Are We Supposed to Go; Human Rights Watch, KRG: Kurdish Forces Ejecting Arabs in Kirkuk Halt Displacements, Demolitions; Compensate Victims (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2016), https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/11/03/krg-kurdish-forces-ejecting-arabs-kirkuk; Human Rights Watch, Marked with an “X.”
70 Amnesty International, Where Are We Supposed to Go; HRW, KRG: Kurdish Forces Ejecting Arabs; Human Rights Watch, Marked with an “X.”
71 Al Hurra Iraq, “The Iraqi Forces Alliance Accuses Kirkuk Authorities of Expelling the Inhabitants of Qarah Tabah Village,” YouTube video, 2:37, October 11, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iipIu3Q_M24.
72 “The Return of the Residents of Qarah Tabah in Parts to Their Homes South of Kirkuk,” Kirkuk Now, March 22, 2017, kirkuknow.com/arabic/. Some reports allege that Qoshqaya and Qotan were razed after their evacuation. “Peshmerga Official: We Have Information Confirming the Cooperation of Some People of Qushqaya and Qutan with Daesh,” Al Sumaria, November 9, 2016.
73 For example, on September 22, 2016, 115 families were evicted from the Laylan IDP camp, and their homes were destroyed. Several Arab IDP families from Hawija were evicted from Kirkuk city as ISIL strengthened its grip on Hawija district. Evictions were carried out by local authorities, aided by the Asayish. Human Rights Watch, KRG: Kurdish Forces Ejecting Arabs. Sunni Arab and Sunni Turkmen IDPs from outside Kirkuk reportedly comprise the majority of the nearly 374,000 IDPs, according to some estimates.
74 Ibid.
75 Amnesty International, Where Are We Supposed to Go; “Iraq: Kirkuk Security Forces Expel Displaced Turkmen,” Human Rights Watch News, May 7, 2017, https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/05/07/iraq-kirkuk-security-forces-expel-displaced-turkmen.
76 “Daesh Expelled from Iraqi Turkmen Village of Bashir, but Village Left in Ruins,” Daily Sabah, May 11, 2016, https://www.dailysabah.com/mideast/2016/05/11/daesh-expelled-from-iraqi-turkmen-village-of-bashir-but-village-left-in-ruins.
77 Hiltermann, “Iraq: the Battle to Come.”
78 An agreement was only reached months later, with the mediation of the top Shi’a cleric’s office.
79 Taei, “Power-Sharing Agreement.”
80 For a more considered discussion of the potential future conflict points in Kirkuk but also more broadly, see Hiltermann, “Iraq: the Battle to Come.”
81 See, e.g., Morgan L. Kaplan and Ramzy Mardini, “The Kurdish region of Iraq is going to vote on independence. Here’s what you need to know,” Washington Post, June 21, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/06/21/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-kurdish-referendum-on-independence/?utm_term=.f85201e42851.
82 For a larger discussion of the PUK and local Kirkuk politicians’ reaction to the referendum, see Hiltermann, “Iraq: the Battle to Come.”