The New Kurdistan - Iraq

March 2002
Kurdistan is blossoming - but it depends on protection from the US and UK. The new found security is fragile, and the second Gulf War could undermine everything.

A deformed baby screams for its mother in the hospital in Halabja -- a living legacy of the long term effects of Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. Today, congenital abnormality rates are 4-5 times higher than post atomic populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. 5000 Kurds were killed by chemical weapons in 1988, as Saddam bombed, burned and bulldozed in his attempts to exterminate the Kurds. Now they have rebuilt 80% of their villages, and Iraqi Kurdistan is undergoing a mini boom. Western style shopping malls are springing up, university students have 50 independent newspapers and internet access. "It really is a tremendous change. We have suffered a lot. We are very happy," comments one shopper. The Kurds see themselves as a model for a democratic Iraq. In 1992, they held elections, formed a parliament and have embraced the ballot box. "To see what we have achieved in a situation where we had no culture of democracy and civil institutions is a great success story," comments Salah Barham of the Kurdish regional government. But the society they have built is incredibly fragile. Saddam has 200.000 troops stationed only 30km away and security depends on the US and UK maintaining no fly zones. Gruesome pictures of 20 decapitated Kurdish fighters near the Iranian border reveals a new immediate threat ; Jund al-Islam -- part of the Al Qaeda network. If President Bush is looking for evidence to link Saddam to Bin Laden, then he might find some here.

Produced by SBS/Dateline
Distributed by Journeyman Pictures

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[KurdishPride952]

@issareign

seriously if i was you i should kill myself being from an ugly people such as arabs.

man you people are soo ugly and soo dark.

me as an aryan kurd feel very special talkig to a inferior raced, dark-skinned ugly arab.

motherfucker, go back to somalia, thats where you people belong.

tfoooooo iraq!! iraq can eat my shit!! SCREW YOU!!"

[ahmed22589]

kurdistan beelal

[unfukkkmee]

INDEPEDENCE FOR THE KURDISH PEOPLE

[JBMakesMeLoseControl]

biji kurd o kurdistan

[kecaAmed21]

fuck arabs, turks and persians

[abdullah7628]

@monk22yrs ok but right now i'm not talking about turks

[monk22yrs]

@abdullah7628 the turks "only" tried wiping out all the kurds, like a bunch of nazis.

[abdullah7628]

@monk22yrs turks are muslims they are nice people and they wasn't with the nazis

[monk22yrs]

@abdullah7628 turkey blows---and kills....and you know it.

sorry, but not everybody who defends kurds and hates turkey is a kurd.

the secret is finally out----turkey tried wiping out kurds the way nazis did with the jews.

[abdullah7628]

@monk22yrs you fucking kurd go learn some english and then comeback and talk