Decision Postponed: Will the Kirkuk Referendum Ever Happen?

One of the vital factors in winning Kurdish support for the 2005 Iraqi constitution was the promise of a referendum on the status of Kirkuk in northern Iraq. Kurds claim the city and its surrounding area should be part of the semi-independent Kurdistan Regional Government. Their claim matters because near Kirkuk is the most important oilfield in northern Iraq, a field which produces nearly half of that country's oil exports.

If the Kurdish autonomous region gets control of such oil riches, there may be serious consequences. The Baghdad government will lose access to much of its income from oil exports and its already tenuous control of the northern Kurdish region will dwindle to almost nothing. An oil-rich Iraqi Kurdistan will also act as a beacon to encourage separatist tendencies among the Kurdish populations of neighbouring countries such as Turkey and Iran.

The Kirkuk oilfield was first discovered in 1927 and went into production in 1934. For more than seven decades this field has provided the backbone of Iraq's oil industry, although new fields were later discovered in the centre and south of the country. This ageing 'supergiant' oilfield is still said to have proven reserves of over ten billion barrels of oil and it currently produces a million barrels a day. Most of this oil is exported by pipeline across Turkey to the port of Ceyhan on the Mediterranean Sea.

Facing a continuing Kurdish insurrection in northern Iraq, the Baghdad government decided in the 1970s to begin a policy of ethnic cleansing in Kirkuk. The majority Kurds and significant minorities such as the Turkomans were expelled from the city and surrounding area, being replaced by Arabs transplanted from central and southern Iraq. This 'Arabization' policy was intensified by Saddam Hussein during the 1980s and by 2000 several hundred thousand people had been removed from their homes in Kirkuk.

After the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, the Kurds demanded that their people should be allowed to return to Kirkuk. This right of return was granted to them and other expelled groups by the 2005 Iraqi constitution. Arabs were to be sent back to their home areas and compensated. Once the demographic balance had been 'normalized' in Kirkuk, a census would be held and a list of voters prepared for a referendum to decide if Kirkuk should be included in the Kurdish autonomous area.

It was envisaged that the 'normalization' of the population and the carrying out of the census would be completed in the summer of 2007, with the referendum taking place in November 2007. Initial delays in the process led to the date of the referendum being changed to 'the end of 2007', but this timetable has now become unrealistic.

Even in early 2007 the Baghdad government was stating that the Kirkuk referendum would have to be postponed. Now it is claimed that the Kurdish authorities are ready to accept a postponement of the vote for some months, perhaps until May 2008. This delay is said to be due to purely administrative problems, but many Kurds are suspicious and some have threatened a unilateral seizure of Kirkuk if the promised referendum does not take place soon.

The Baghdad government and many American officials would like to see the referendum postponed for some years, if not indefinitely, to avoid provoking bloody ethnic conflict in a part of Iraq which has so far seen comparatively little violence. Neighbouring countries such as Turkey and Iran take a similar view of the proposed referendum because of fears about its impact on their own Kurdish populations. But how long will the Kurds tolerate such postponement?

If the Iraqi Kurds take control of Kirkuk, whether by democratic vote or unilateral action, Turkey has threatened to take military measures against them. This would not only be to protect the Turkoman minority in the city, but also to avoid any possibility of the creation of an oil-rich independent Kurdish state. Of course military action may not be needed to curb the Iraqi Kurds. All Turkey has to do is close the pipeline to Ceyhan and so end oil exports from Kirkuk, although this would probably cause a sharp rise in the world oil price.

The Kurdistan Regional Government is no doubt conscious of these possible actions by rival powers, but it has only limited room to manoeuvre on the Kirkuk issue. A postponement of the referendum for a few months may be acceptable. However, if further postponements follow, direct action can be expected from the more extreme Kurdish nationalists, with possibly dangerous consequences for both Iraq and the wider Middle East.