LONDON, March 23 (UPI) -- Iraq's minority Turkmen community are opposed to the newly-endorsed interim constitution that will rule their country during the transitional phase on the grounds that it "marginalizes" their role as Iraq's third ethnic group.
Turkmen's political parties threatened to declare the state of "Iraq's Turkmenistan" with the oil-center of Kirkuk as its capital if the interim constitution signed by the Iraqi Government Council earlier this month is not amended to guarantee their rights and role in the country.
Anwar Niazi, politburo member of the Turkmen's al-Akhaa'Party told United Press International in a telephone interview from Baghdad that the "interim constitution bluntly ignored the rights of Iraq's Turkmen community, leaving no room for political maneuvering for Turkmen parties."
"The most dangerous thing is that the interim document is considered as the constitution of Iraq for an indefinite period of time, threatening to consecrate the marginalization of the Turkmen and depriving them of their present rights," Niazi said.
The interim constitution is to rule Iraq during the transitional phase that starts July 1, the deadline for transferring powers to Iraqis, until general elections are held for a legislative assembly that will be entrusted with drafting the country's permanent constitution.
Soun Kul Jabok, the Turkmen's representative in the 25-member Governing Council, threatened last month to declare the entity of "Iraq's Turkmenistan" in the north of the country if the Kurds insisted on federal rule for Iraq's Kurdistan.
Nevertheless, Jabok placed her signature on the interim constitution draft, which is rejected by leading Turkmen parties, including the Iraqi Turkmen Front, the Turkmen People's Party, al-Akhaa' Party, the Turkmen National Front and the Islamic Party of Iraq's Turkmen.
None of these groups has good relations with the two main Kurdish parties -- notably, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan led by Jalal Talabani, and the Kurdish Democratic Party of Massud Barzani.
Turkmen parties dislike the fact that the interim constitution, whose signing was postponed twice due to differences between the various Iraqi factions, gave the Kurds a large margin of independence.
Kurds accuse the Turkmen community of subordination to Turkey which dreads the rise of a federation in Iraq that will give the Kurds greater independence from Baghdad.
The Iraqi Governing Council affirms that the interim constitution is for a transitional period that would not exceed one year.
But Niazi fears that "the interim document could become a permanent norm or tradition for dealing with essential issues."
He also expressed great doubt that the future Iraqi authorities will be able to conduct sound and correct elections within a definite period of time and was skeptical that Iraq will get a permanent constitution "if internal struggle and disputes" between the country's main ethnic groups persisted.
Niazi noted that Iraq's Turkmen community exercised their rights during monarchy rule more than they did under republican regimes.
He said the Turkmen were deprived of their rights for long years during the Baath Party rule and were oppressed and persecuted but kept their faith in a free, united and democratic Iraq, "not a federal country divided along ethnic and sectarian lines."
Salman Karkukli, head of the Turkmen National Front in Iraq, blasted the interim constitution which he said "ignored the rights of the Turkmen people and undermined their role within their own country.
He said the Turkmen community, estimated at more than 3 million of Iraq's population of 27 million, "decided not to abide by the interim constitution's clauses."
Karkukli said the Turkmen plan to declare the state of Iraq's Turkmenistan with Kirkuk as its capital "in order to put an end to the violations and harms committed against them."
He called for recognizing the Turkmen as the third ethnic group in the country and declaring the Turkmen language as the third official language in the state after Arabic and Kurdish.
Karkukli also demanded to "safeguard the Turkmen character of Kirkuk by securing the withdrawal of Kurdish forces from the city and halting attempts to change its demographic structure and that of other Turkmen towns."
Jabok, the Turkmen representative in the Governing Council, had previously accused the Kurds of "seeking to change social and demographic" facts in Kirkuk, which she said was initially inhabited by the Turkmen before the Kurds arrived there in the late 1950s.
"The Kurds believed that a federal system is the best solution for guaranteeing their rights. ... We (Turkmen) are not opposed to federation as such, but we refuse to give one faction authority over the other, and we refuse demographic changes in the city," Jabok said.
Tension escalated in Kirkuk and surrounding region following the assassination of Akkar al-Tawil, the Arab representative in the city's local council, earlier this month.
Two Turkmen leaders, Farouk Abdullah Abdel Rahman and Sobhi Saber from the Turkmen Front party, escaped attempts on their lives in February.
The Turkmen people are believed to make up 10 percent of Iraq's populations, and they are mainly concentrated in the districts of Khormatu, Dakouk, Toz, and Kirkuk, which are also home for Arab, Kurdish, Chaldean and Assyrian communities.
The chief of the Islamic Movement for Iraq's Turkmen, Sami Donmez, also rejected the interim constitution on the grounds that "it is void of any indication to the rights of the Turkmen people."
"We in the Islamic Movement of Iraq's Turkmen assert our rejection to that interim draft because it did not recognize the Turkmen as the country's third ethnic group and did not guarantee our rights and existence," Donmez said in a statement received by UPI.
He warned that the Turkmen will be "forced to resort to other means to recover their legitimate rights, which were lost under the former racist regime and were ignored by those who drafted the new constitution."
Donmez did not elaborate on the alternative means.
