From: henry999@eircom.net   
      
   jan bojer vindheim  wrote:   
      
   > The kurds are demanding a   
   > federal government in Iraq, as against the centralization favoured bythe   
   > arabs.   
   >   
   > The kurdish fear is now that they will once again be betrayed by the   
   > Americans.   
      
   It will be interesting to see how this plays out, since the Turks will   
   of course oppose to their utmost any sort of Kurdish political entity   
   whatsoever--seeing (rightly?) such a thing, even a   
   federated-Kurdish-state within the New Iraq, as a powerful magnet for   
   the Kurds presently under Turkish 'control' whom Ankara has been   
   repressing all these many years.   
      
   Alas, the Kurdish fears of impending betrayal (once again) seem   
   well-founded. The Turkish parliament may have thrown a spanner in the   
   works of the American plan for the invasion of Iraq last year by   
   forbidding, counter to the wishes of the government, massive US troop   
   movements through Turkey (specifically, through Turkish Kurdistan). But   
   the punishment they incurred for such temerity appears to have taught   
   them a lesson. Even more importantly, however, the Turks are desperate   
   to join the EU and I suspect that in the future they _will_ dance,   
   happily or no, to whatever tune the Western fiddlers play.   
      
   cheers,   
      
   Henry   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)