I saw and ad for Kurdistan in the middle of Hardball! :crazy:
http://theotheriraq.com/Have you seen the Other Iraq?
It's spectacular.
It's peaceful.
Welcome to Iraqi Kurdistan.
Where democracy has been practiced for over a decade. It's not a dream.
It's the other Iraq.
The people of Iraqi-Kurdistan invite you to discover their peaceful region, a place that has practiced democracy for over a decade, a place where the universities, markets, cafes and fair grounds buzz with progress and prosperity and where the people are already sowing the
seeds of a brighter future.
... I guess the separation of The Kurds from the rest of Iraq is now a done deal. I wonder if bush knows.
On Edit: Not so fast....
Kirkuk: The potential spark for civil war
By Ahmed Janabi
Wednesday 13 September 2006, 22:40 Makka Time, 19:40 GMT
Kirkuk, Iraq's oil-rich northern city, is probably the most critical area for the future of Iraq, but the least covered by international media.
Historically, the city accommodates people from Iraq's three biggest ethnic groups: Turkmen, Arabs and Kurds. The groups have been engaged in a prolonged dispute over the city's identity, with each side claiming ownership of the 5000-year-old metropolis.
Being the centre of Iraq's northern oil industry, the Kurds see the Kirkuk region as vital for their long awaited "independent state of Kurdistan". Attacks on the infrastructure of the Kirkuk oil industry have been ongoing since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.
<snip>
A referendum is to be held in late 2007 to decide the city's fate. But Arabs and Turkmen say the Kurds are using their political new power and the support of the US to manipulate it.
The situation has provoked Kirkuk's non-Kurdish communities and plunged the city into a fierce war.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/687C9530-F195-4828-A220-D2D33969C9BE.htm