Armed groups under the Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF) continue to commit crimes against Kurds following the Iraqi army and Hashd al-Shaabi’s attacks on Southern Kurdistan territory.

The ITF, founded with support from the MİT by some Sunni Turkmen groups in Hewlêr in 1997, had not resisted against the ISIS attacks on Tal Afar and Kirkuk in 2014 and had fled, seeking refuge with the peshmerga. ITF members led by Ershad Salihi had looted Shia Turkmens’ homes in many areas.

In the rescue operation for Tal Afar in August 2017 by the Iraqi army and Hashd al-Shaabi, ITF’s armed members had gone under the umbrella of Esayîb Al Haq, known for their ties to Iran, as a result of the relationship between Iran and Turkey. Ershad Salihi and those who accompanied him entered Telafer after it was taken and put up a flag in a children’s park in the city.

The ITF’s armed forces, acting under the Esayîb El Hak who leads the Qeys El Xezalî known for their ties with Qasem Soleimani, Commander of the Qods Forces of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), carried out attacks against Kurds in many areas including Tuz Khurmatu, Dakuk and Kirkuk after the attacks on October 16.

CRIMES OF THE ITF

Rojnews has listed some of the ITF’s crimes:

- On September 18 in Kirkuk, the motorcade held by young people was shot at from an ITC building. A young man named Raid Ebdulqadir Ebdurahman lost his life in the attack and 5 young people were wounded.

- On the day of the referendum, one peshmerga lost his life as a result of the Iraqi Turkmen Front’s fire and one other was wounded in Tuz Khurmatu.

- During the October 16 attacks, Kurdish homes marked on the doors beforehand in the Askari and Cumhuri neighborhoods of Tuz Khurmatu were looted.

- According to witnesses, the ITF gangs raided a Kurdish family’s home in Tuz Khurmatu and attempted to rape 3 sisters. But other groups in the Hashd al-Shaabi intervened and ITF gangs abandoned the attempted rape.

- A PUK building was targeted in Tuz Khurmatu. 15 peshmergas and volunteers were massacred. Many of the dead were reportedly decapitated.

- PKK member Hogir Baran who lives in Dakuk was taken to the Ottoman bridge, and executed.

- Kurdistan Free Society Movement’s (Tevgera Azadi) offices in Tuz Khurmatu, Dakûk and Kirkuk were set on fire and the assets were insulted.

- It was again the ITF members who took down Southern Kurdistan flags from the Kirkuk Fortress and many other places in the city and trampled them.

- The peshmerga statue on the Kirkuk-Hewlêr road was set on fire by the ITF members. ITC members set fire to the scaffolding around the newly finished statue and damaged the statue itself. With the Iraqi police’s intervention, the statue did not fall.

- A historic monastery in Kirkuk’s Pence Elî neighborhood was damaged and looted by the ITF, and a Turkmen flag was put up.

- In neighborhoods like Rehimawa, Kerama, Pence Elî and others with a dense Kurdish population, Kurdish political parties and offices were looted.

HOW WAS IT FOUNDED?

Following the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) pushing the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) out of Hewlêr with Saddam Hussein’s tanks on August 31, 1996 and killing over 80 wounded PKK members in May 1997, the MİT held the First Turkmen Council in Hewlêr in October 1997 and formed the ITF. ITF had been connected to the explosions in Kirkuk after 2003 and the massacres in Shengal in 2007.

ALLIANCE IN ANIMOSITY AGAINST KURDS

Reports say the recent alliance between Turkey and Iran on the basis of animosity against Kurds is behind ITF’s submission to Iran-backed groups. As the Mosul operation launched in October 2017, Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan and AKP officials repeatedly called Hashd al-Shaabi terrorists and accused them of “killing Turkmens”. But when Tal Afar was taken by Hashd al-Shaabi, Turkey stayed silent.