SLAUGHTERING OF TWO TURKMEN TEACHERS IN KIRKUK

On the Sunday 16^th of December 2012 four masked gunmen drove a Kia model car carrying automatic machine guns and snipers in area near village of Alzirkatta Arifeyat which is attached to the sub_district Alrashad located 60km southern city of Kerkuk.

The four gunmen kidnapped two Turkmen teachers including Abdel Hussein Mahmoud Hamdi, and Kasim Naseh Shoukur.

Abdel _Hussein Mahmoud Hamdi was born in 1976 and was appointed as a teacher at Rumaythah School on the administrative order number 6065 on 06^th of March 2005 and commenced teaching on the 9^th of March 2005.

Whereas, Kasim Naseh Shoukur who was born in 1976 and graduated from the University of Mosul in northern of Iraq was appointed as a teacher at the Rumaythah school on the administrative order number 742 on the 11^th of January 2005 and he commenced teaching on the 12^th January 2005.

On the Monday, 17the of December 2012, the bodies of two abducted teachers were thrown on the road side near the Humera village, which is located 35km south of Kirkuk, both bodies were carrying signs and traces of torture and bullets and both bodies were burnt.

The death of these two Turkmen generated deep reactions among the Turkmen in Iraq and the incident shocked the Iraqi people. In the view of many of the Turkmen, the two teachers were killed for sectarian reason and for only being Turkmen. It is the view many of Turkmen that the organization and military group behind this brutal attack and atrocity is to fulfill their political agenda by bring the fear into Turkmen ethnics and forcing and displacing them from their land in Turkmeneli and more specifically, the city of Kerkuk which is considered the hub for the Iraqi oil production.

Both Kurds and Arabs are fighting to control the city of Kerkuk for economical reasons although the indigenous people of Kerkuk are actually Turkmen. However, in the city of Kerkuk, the focus as on the Turkmen population which was subjected to brutal Arabization policies that were carried out by the Saddam Hussein government to eliminate the Turkmen identity in Kerkuk.

However, since the fall of the Saddam Hussein government in 2003, the city of Kerkuk has been subjected to major demographic changes by the Kurds in a more brutal way than that which was carried out by the Saddam Hussein government.

The demographic changes that have been carried out by the Kurds is to obliterated and diminish the Turkmen identity in the city of Kerkuk, then to control the hub of the Kerkuk oil which is considered the vein of the Iraqi economy. Kurds would like to add Kirkuk to their nearby semi-autonomous region, but Arabs and Turkmen in the city categorically oppose this idea.

By Mofak Salman

Mofak Salman Kerküklu graduated in England with a BSc in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from Oxford Brookes University and completed an MSc in Medical Electronics and Physics at London University and an MSc in Computing Science and Information Technology at South Bank University. The author was born in Türkmen sub district of Altunkopru in district of Numra Sekiz (district of Debis).

He is also a Chartered Engineer from the Institution of Engineers of Ireland. Mr Mofak Salman is the author of Brief History of Iraqi Türkmen, Türkmen of Iraq, Türkmen city of Tuz Khormatu and A report into Kurdish Abuse in Türkmeneli. He has had a large number of articles published in various newspapers and websites.

Dublin, Ireland