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- <text>
- <title>
- Commentary Says Kurds Seek Peaceful Solution
- </title>
- <article>
- <hdr>
- Foreign Broadcast Information Service, March 26, 1992
- Iraq: Commentary Says Kurds Seek Peaceful Solution
- </hdr>
- <body>
- <p>[Station commentary. (Clandestine) Voice of Iraqi Kurdistan in
- Arabic 1845 GMT 20 Mar 92]
- </p>
- <p> [Excerpt] In the name of God, the merciful, the
- compassionate. The Kurdish people have always been the victim of
- two things: persecution on a national basis and despotism on the
- local level, and the complicated regional and international
- alliances.
- </p>
- <p> Dear listeners: The Kurdish people have always shown good
- intentions. They are a peace-loving people who respond to any
- move toward peace and who want to live in tranquility and safety
- in their homeland. This is the stand that the Kurdish people
- have always adopted and this will continue to be their stand on
- the condition that they can live in freedom, with their heads
- high, and enjoy their legitimate national rights far from
- despotism, terrorism, and encroachments.
- </p>
- <p> Since its establishment in March 1988 the Iraqi Kurdistan
- Front has adopted this trend and has supported the efforts for a
- peaceful solution to the Kurdish issue if the appropriate
- conditions become available. In April 1991 the Front reiterated
- its democratic and peaceful course of action. From this premise
- it held negotiations with the Iraqi government to attain a
- suitable formula for settling the cause, a formula that
- satisfies the Kurdish people's rights, meets their aspirations,
- and secures human rights and democracy in Iraq.
- [passage omitted]
- </p>
- <p> The Iraqi Kurdistan Front has sent several delegation to
- Baghdad, including the visit of brother Mas'ud al-Barzani, to
- settle the problems, particularly the lifting of the economic
- and administrative siege. So far, however, the Iraqi authorities
- have not responded. On the contrary they tightened the siege and
- caused many human tragedies this winter as a result of the acute
- shortage of fuel. It has also been noticed that provocations and
- reinforcements by the Iraqi Army have been intensified along the
- contact lines in the various parts of Kurdistan.
- </p>
- <p> We wonder: Does such a stand serve the resumption of the
- negotiations? Who should take the initiative to settle problems?
- </p>
- <p> For our part we have offered all that is within our means to
- make the negotiations a success. We believe that we have done so
- and we have worked for this objective. Then why not lift the
- siege? Why this escalation of the situation?
- </p>
- <p> Free Arabs, wherever you may be in the Arab world, our
- beloved citizens, the sons of the glorious, steadfast, and
- patient Iraqi people, and our militant sons of Kurdistan, be
- alert and watch out for evil attempts, God forbid. Our bitter
- experience from scores of incidents and events since the
- establishment of the state of Iraq in the twenties has taught us
- how they can mix poison with honey and how they utter sweet
- words while preparing for treachery.
- </p>
- <p> We ask God to protect the Iraqi and Kurdish people from any
- treacherous act or tragedy, particularly during this blessed
- month of Ramadan. We take God as our witness that the Kurdish
- people really seek peace and really seek a peaceful solution to
- their cause. We take God as our witness that in spite of their
- sufferings and deep wounds our people have tried to rise above
- all their sufferings for the sake of preserving the Iraqis'
- blood and the lives of the remaining Kurds so that they may
- again enjoy stability in their homes and areas and resume their
- normal lives in the way that the other people on this earth
- live. This peaceful and good people has never attacked anyone.
- On the contrary, it was others who slaughtered them and who
- exterminated them in their own homes, farms, and fields.
- </p>
- </body>
- </article>
- </text>
-