The ministerial committee, formed by Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani, consisted of representatives from Iraq’s justice, finance, defence, oil and agriculture ministries. They met with dozens of Kurdish and Turkmen farmers and Arab settlers.
Kurds and Turkmens accuse Arab settlers of trying to confiscate their farmlands in several villages.
Hatem Mazal is an Arab settler. He admitted to a Kurdish farmer ahead of the meeting with the ministerial committee that Kurds are the original owners of the farmland, adding that the lands were given to them by the government.
“The task of the committee is to conduct a field inspection of the situation and present decisive recommendations. The final decision will be made by the prime minister,” Ziad Khalifa Tamimi, head of the committee, told reporters.
Kurdish and Turkmen farmers presented documents to the committee which they said supports their claim of the disputed farmlands.
The dispute between Arab settlers and Kurdish farmers dates back to the Baathist era. Land belonging to several villages was taken away from Kurdish farmers by the Iraqi government in 1975 on the grounds that they were located in prohibited oil zones. Two years later, under Decree No. 949 issued by the Baath Supreme Revolutionary Court, the land was given to Arabs who were resettled in the area from elsewhere in Iraq.
Kurds call for the dissolution of decrees issued by the collapsed regime.
The Arabization of the province has been a historical flashpoint between Baghdad and the Kurds.
After 2003 and the fall of the Baath regime, Iraq began a policy of de-Arabization within the framework of Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution, which aims to reverse the demographic changes carried out by former dictator Hussein. The article has never been fully implemented, however, and land disputes still exist.
Kurdish farmers in Kirkuk on Thursday started harvesting their crops after a delegation from the federal parliament temporarily resolved a land dispute with Arab settlers.
