ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Kurdish farmers in a Kirkuk village have been unable to cultivate their lands for weeks due to decades-long land disputes with Arab settlers despite efforts by local authorities to resolve the issue.
Earlier this month, the Iraqi army warned Kurdish farmers in Sargaran subdistrict that they were not allowed to plow their farms as planting season approached.
Mohammed Amin, head of the farmers’ defense committee in the subdistrict, told Rudaw on Monday that the ban is still in place.
“We are still unable to plow our farms,” he said, adding that there are ongoing efforts, mediated by Governor Rebwar Taha, to reach an agreement with Arab settlers to resolve the issue.
Arab settlers had previously presented a letter from the Iraqi military’s Joint Operations Command, claiming ownership of the land based on the 1957 census and preventing Kurds from working the fields.
Earlier this month, Taha said that he would resolve the issue “as per the law,” and expressed support for passing a land restitution bill that is in the Iraqi parliament that seeks to return confiscated lands to their original owners.
In May, heightened tensions between Kurdish farmers and Arab settlers reached a boiling point near the village of Palkana after the settlers prevented farmers from harvesting their crops, citing ownership documents for the land that date back to the Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein.
Disputes between Arab settlers and Kurdish farmers date back to the Baathist era. Land in 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.
After 2003 and the fall of the Baath regime, Iraq began a policy of de-Arabization within the framework of Article 140 of the constitution, which aims to reverse the demographic changes carried out by former dictator Saddam Hussein. The article has never been fully implemented, however, and land disputes still exist.
The land restitution bill, submitted by Kurdish lawmakers, has faced opposition from Arab legislators.
Soran Hussein contributed to this report.
