Kurdish-Arab relations tense in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Feb. 19 (UPI) -- Statements from Kurdish leaders warning of war if regional differences are left unsettled before U.S. troops leave are a national disservice, officials said.

Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government Nechirvan Barzani said conflict could erupt between Arabs and Kurds in Iraq if regional differences remain following a U.S. troop withdrawal.

Kurdish lawmakers are at odds with the government in Baghdad over so-called disputed territories along a U.N.-delineated Green Line defining the Kurdish region.

Sami al-Askari, a Shiite lawmaker and close confidant to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, told London's Asharq al-Awsat newspaper that violence was no longer the method of conflict resolution in Iraq.

"The war method is gone forever," he said, adding that such disputes only emphasized the need for a strong central government in Baghdad.

Falah Mustafa Bakir, the KRG foreign minister, told the newspaper that the general sentiments were not so much saber rattling as they were an expression of the "political determination" needed to resolve the issue.

Various reports suggest the dispute will have a major impact on the future of American forces in Iraq, though the spokesman of the multinational forces in Iraq, Muqdad Jibril, said the row is largely "a national Iraqi question."