As results come in from the Kurdistan Regional Government's referendum on independence from Iraq, Baghdad is rejecting the vote as illegitimate and refusing all talks on the matter. Turkey has threatened to seal the KRG's borders. One deadly clash was reported between Kurdish Peshmerga and a Turkmen militia at a town contested between Baghdad and the KRG.
Baghdad and Iraq's Kurdistan Region are at odds over the referendum on Kurdish indpendence to be held this month. A particular sticking point is the inclusion of oil-rich Kirkuk in the vote—not within the Kurdistan Regional Government's formal borders, but under its de facto control since Kurdish forces occupied the city with the collapse of the Iraqi army during the ISIS offensive of June 2014.
With the Syrian Kurds now facing open war from both Turkey and the Assad regime, the imminent taking of Raqqa portends a multi-sided scramble for former ISIS territory.
Authorities in Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region announced that a referendum on independence will be held in September—drawing immediate harsh criticism from Baghdad.
Libya's Constitution Drafting Assembly is under harsh critcism from women's rights advocates, while Berber leaders have called for a boycott to press demands on language rights.
TheĀ Rojava Kurds, caught in a pincer between Turkey and ISIS, are being forced to accept superpower aidābut with costs for Syrian revolutionary unity against ISIS and Assad.
Insistence on regional autonomy and a federal solution for Syria is straining the de facto alliance between the Rojava Kurds and Damascus, despite their mutual enmity for Turkey.
The voteĀ over the name change from South Ossetia to Alania reveals how the autonomist aspirations of the Ossetians (however legitimate) have been exploited in the Great Game. (Map: Wikipedia)
The UK Supreme Court ruled that Scotland and Wales may join a case challenging Prime Minister Theresa May’s power to leave the EU without a parliamentary vote.
Trump intends to divide Syria with Putin the way Hitler divided Poland with Stalin—but will the US will be able to control its sphere amid social collapse and sectarian maelstrom?
As Turkey turns its warplanes on the autonomous Kurds of northern Syria, state media release propaganda maps showing claims to former Ottoman lands in Syria and Iraq alike.
The announced new cooperation between imperial rivals the US, Russia and Turkey can only mean a betrayal of the Rojava Kurds and and other democratic forces in Syria.
