Kirkuk is a city in Iraq, serving as the capital of the Kirkuk Governorate, located 238 kilometres north of Baghdad. The city is home to a diverse population of Kurds, Iraqi Turkmens and Arabs. Kirkuk sits on the ruins of the original Kirkuk Citadel which sits near the Khasa River.
Kirkuk Governorate or Kirkuk Province is a governorate in northern Iraq. The governorate has an area of 9,679 square kilometres (3,737 sq mi). In 2017, the estimated population was 1,259,561 people. The provincial capital is the city of Kirkuk. It is divided into four districts.
Nineveh or Ninawa Governorate is a governorate in northern Iraq. It has an area of 37,323 km2 (14,410 sq mi) and an estimated population of 2,453,000 people as of 2003. Its largest city and provincial capital is Mosul, which lies across the Tigris river from the ruins of ancient Nineveh. Before 1976, it was called Mosul Province and included the present-day Dohuk Governorate. The second largest city is Tal Afar, which has an almost exclusively Turkmen population.
Minorities in Iraq have been incredibly influential to the history of the country, and consist of various ethnic and religious groups. The largest minority group in Iraq is the Kurds, with Turkmen following shortly after. Prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Assyrians constituted a sizeable population of 1.5 million, and belonged to various different churches such as the Assyrian Church of the East, Chaldean Catholic Church, and the Syriac Orthodox/Catholic Churches. Other minority groups in Iraq include Armenians, Mandaeans, Baha'i, and Marsh Arabs, among others.
The Iraqi Turkmen, also referred to as Iraqi Turks, Turkish-Iraqis, the Turkish minority in Iraq, and the Iraqi-Turkish minority are Iraq's third largest ethnic group. They make up to 10%–13% of the Iraqi population and are native to northern Iraq. Iraqi Turkmen share ties with Turkish people, and do not identify with the Turkmen of Turkmenistan and Central Asia.
Tuz Khurmatu is the central city of Tooz District in Saladin Governorate, Iraq, located 55 miles (89 km) south of Kirkuk. Its inhabitants are predominantly Shia Turkmen, with a minority of Arabs and Kurds.
Turkmeneli, also known as Turkmenland, and historically as Turcomania,, and East Turkmeneli is a political term used to define the vast swath of territory in which the Iraqi Turkmens historically have had a dominant population. The term incorporates the Iraqi Turkmen homelands running from Iraq's border with Turkey and Syria and diagonally down the country to the border with Iran. It is sometimes referred to as East Turkmeneli to distinguish from the Syrian Turkmen homeland, known as West Turkmeneli. Apart from the designation of the region as Turcomania in a 1785 map by William Guthrie, there's no certain mention of the region in published works until the establishment of the Iraqi Turkmen Front.
Türkmeneli Televizyonu, or simply Türkmeneli TV, is a television station in Iraq which broadcasts the interests of the Iraqi Turkmen community. It is available on two satellites: Turksat and Nilesat, and broadcasts in the Turkish and Arabic languages. The channel produces a variety of programmes, such as news, documentaries on Iraqi Turkmen history, language, politics, and music.
Altun Kupri is a town in Kirkuk Governorate, Iraq. Its inhabitants are predominantly Turkmen, with a minority of Arabs and Kurds. It is located on the shores of the Little Zab and on the Erbil–Kirkuk road. The town is described as having an 'intrinsic strategic significance' and is disputed.
Arshad al-Salihi is an Iraqi Turkmen politician who has been leader of the Iraqi Turkmen Front since May 2011, and a member of the Iraqi parliament since 2010.
An independence referendum for the Kurdistan Region of Iraq was held on 25 September 2017 in Kurdistan Region, with preliminary results showing approximately 92.73 percent of votes cast in favour of independence. Despite reporting that the independence referendum would be non-binding, the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) characterised it as binding, although they claimed that an affirmative result would trigger the start of state building and negotiations with Iraq rather than an immediate declaration of independence of Kurdistan. The referendum's legality was rejected by the federal government of Iraq and the Federal Supreme Court. KRG eventually conceded and accepted the Supreme Court’s ruling that no Iraqi governorate is allowed to secede.
The Battle of Kirkuk (2017), part of the 2017 Iraqi–Kurdish conflict, was a military deployment by the Iraqi Security Forces to retake Kirkuk Governorate from the Peshmerga after the latter ignored repeated warnings to withdraw, sparking clashes between the two forces. The advance began on 15 October 2017, with the city of Kirkuk being retaken the following day. Iraqi central government forces continued their advances in subsequent days, routing the Peshmerga forces across vast swathes of territory in northern Iraq.
The 2017 Iraqi–Kurdish conflict, also known as the Kirkuk crisis, was a conflict in which the Iraqi government retook disputed territories in Iraq which had been held by the Peshmerga since ISIL's Northern Iraq offensive in 2014. The conflict began on 15 October 2017 after tensions arising from the Kurdistan Region independence referendum of 25 September. The tension between the federal Iraqi government and Kurdistan Region escalated into conflict when the Peshmerga ignored repeated warnings to return Kirkuk to Iraqi government forces. Part of the conflict was the Battle of Kirkuk, when Iraqi forces routed Peshmerga forces from the city in a surprise dawn-offensive, marking the beginning of clashes.
Assi al-Qawali is an Iraqi-Kurdish insurgent leader and a former Peshmerga volunteer that is allegedly the leader of the White Flags which is believed to be a splinter group of Ansar al-Islam by the government of Iraq and some observers.
The 1991 Altun Kupri massacre occurred on 28 March 1991 in the Turkmen town of Altun Kupri, Kirkuk Governorate, Iraq. The massacre targeted Turkmens, in particular males, both children and adults alike, and was organized by security forces affiliated with Saddam Hussein's army. It came as a result of curbing the 1991 uprising in the dissident areas in the north and south of the country.
The Iraqi Turkmen genocide refers to the series of killings, rapes, executions, expulsions, and sexual slavery of Iraqi Turkmen by the Islamic State. It began when ISIS captured Iraqi Turkmen lands in 2014 and it continued until ISIS lost all of their land in Iraq. In 2017, ISIS's persecution of Iraqi Turkmen was officially recognized as a genocide by the Parliament of Iraq, and in 2018, the sexual slavery of Iraqi Turkmen girls and women was recognized by the United Nations.
Hasan Turan, Iraqi Turkman politician and activist. He is the chairman of Iraqi Turkmen Front since 28 March 2021.
This is a timeline of events during the Islamic State insurgency in Iraq (2017–present) in 2018.
The 1959 Kirkuk massacre was a massacre of Iraqi Turkmen in Kirkuk, Iraq, which lasted from 14 July to 16 July 1959. The perpetrators were Kurds from the Iraqi Communist Party, the massacre also changed the previously positive Turkmen-Kurdish relationship in Iraq and created a long-lasting ethnic-based stigma. The event is deeply rooted in the collective memory of the Iraqi Turkmen. The massacre is described as an ethnic, rather than political tension.
The Erbil massacre happened during raids on the Iraqi Turkmen Front in Erbil by the Iraqi Armed Forces, and the killing of 48 people and the arrest of 38, on August 31, 1996.
