US embassy cable - 03ANKARA7493

UNCLAS ANKARA 007493 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL, PTER, PREF, MARR, TU, IZ 
SUBJECT: IRAQI TURKMEN FRONT REPS SAY ITF WILL SUPPORT 
FEDERALISM BASED ON GOVERNORATES, NOT OPPOSED TO RETURN OF 
DISPLACED KURDS TO KIRKUK, PLEDGE COOPERATION AND SUPPORT 
FOR COALITION 
 
(U) Sensitive but unclassified - please protect accordingly. 
 
 
1. (SBU) Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF) Ankara and London reps 
Ahmet Muratli and Asif Sertturkmen called on PolMilOff Dec. 
5.  They complained that Kurdish parties were flying flags 
all over Kirkuk, an act they considered provocative.  They 
also complained that Kurds were disproportionately being 
given jobs in Kirkuk (claiming that 80 to 85 percent of jobs 
had gone to Kurds) and that "huge numbers" of Kurds had 
recently moved into Kirkuk.  Muratli and Sertturkmen 
emphasized that the ITF was not opposed to the return to 
Kirkuk of Kurds who had been displaced by Saddam.  They also 
pledged their full cooperation and support for the coalition, 
and expressed frustration that their new leader, Faruk 
Abdulrahman, had been unable to get an appointment to meet 
with Amb. Bremer.  The ITF and Abdulrahman, they stressed, 
wanted good contact with the CPA.  They also wanted the 
coalition to succeed so that when it left Iraq, it would do 
so proud of its accomplishments. 
 
 
2. (SBU) The ITF reps said the party's goal was to bring all 
Turkmen together under one political umbrella, and that since 
the ITF Congress in September, they believed they represented 
80 percent of all Iraqi Turkmen. (NOTE: Before the war the 
ITF claimed to represent all Iraqi Turkmen.)  They also said 
their new leadership has made clear that the ITF has opened 
the door to good relations with all of Iraq's political 
parties, including the Kurds.  The ITF, they said, seeks a 
unified Iraq in which all groups can retain their identity by 
preserving their language, culture and heritage.  While the 
ITF firmly opposes federalism in Iraq based on ethnic or 
broad geographic divisions, Muratli and Sertturkmen stated 
that the ITF would support federalism based on the old Iraqi 
governorates, "like the states in the US or Canada."  They 
said the ITF's new slogan is, "Everything is for Iraq." 
 
 
3. (SBU)  Muratli and Sertturkmen said that the ITF looked 
forward to elections that would secure Turkmen (and the ITF 
in particular) seats in government commensurate with their 
share of the population (they asserted that there were 3 
million Iraqi Turkmen) and that would allow other parties who 
were excluded from the Iraqi Governing council, such as the 
Constitutional Monarchists, to be represented.  PolMilOff 
went through the details of the Nov. 15 IGC-CPA agreement 
with them and urged them to be active in the Iraqi political 
process between now and elections, but cautioned that 
election results would likely not be strictly along ethnic 
lines and therefore ethnic groups' representation in 
government would not be a direct reflection of their share of 
the population. 
 
 
4. (SBU) The ITF reps reported that the party has very 
limited funding and cannot afford to run advertisements or 
regularly publish a newspaper.  They said their funding comes 
mainly from the Turkmen NGO the Turkmeneli Foundation and 
from very limited donations from outside Iraq.  They said 
they would continue to maintain offices in Washington, DC, 
Berlin, London and Ankara for the foreseeable future. 
 
 
5. (U) Baghdad minimize considered. 
EDELMAN