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August 24, 2008
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Kurdish official condemns Iraqi army raid on Peshmerga HQ
Voices of Iraq
SULAIMANIYA – A representative of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan's (PUK) secretary general on Sunday condemned an Iraqi army raid on the headquarters of the Peshmerga forces in Qurat Tabba, describing the act as one of the "blunders" of the Iraqi army.
"On Saturday, Iraqi army forces entered the headquarters of Kurdish parties in Qurat Tabba areas," Mahmoud Sankawi told Voices of Iraq- (VOI).
"We have informed the deputy prime minister, Burham Saleh, of the incident and submitted a memorandum to the prime minister in which we explained that the Peshmerga forces are not Mahdi army militia groups…," Sankawi noted.
The Mahdi army is the military wing of the Sadrist movement, which is led by Shiite Cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and holds 30 seats in the 275-member parliament.
Political tensions erupted between Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government and the Mahdi Army following a military operation by Iraqi forces in Basra and Baghdad's eastern city of Sadr in May with the aim of tracking down armed groups and outlaws.
Sankawi added that Saleh held a meeting with the minister of defense, during which they agreed to postpone the evacuation of governmental buildings, which are currently occupied by Kurdish parties.
VOI has made every effort to contact government sources, but to no avail.
On Saturday morning, Iraqi army personnel raided the headquarters of the PUK, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Kurdistan Communist Party, lowering the flag of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).
In cooperation with the Multi-National Force (MNF), Iraqi forces have launched a wide-scale security operation called Bashaer al-Kheir (Promise of Good) in Diala province with the aim of eliminating armed groups.
In the past three weeks, the operation included the areas of Jalawlaa, al-Saadiya, and Qurat Tabba, which is affiliated with Diala's Khanaqin district.
The central government has ordered Kurdish bodies to hand over the security responsibility of Diala's border areas to the Iraqi army and withdraw their Peshmerga forces from those areas.
The Peshmerga is a term used by the Kurds to refer to armed Kurdish fighters.
Diala province extends to the northeast of Baghdad as far as the Iranian border. Its capital is Baaquba. It covers an area of 17,685 square kilometers (6,828 sq mi).
A large portion of the province is drained by the Diala River, a major tributary of the Tigris.
Because of its proximity to two major sources of water, Diala's main industry is agriculture, primarily dates grown in large Date Palm groves. It is also recognized as the orange capital of the Middle East.
In January 2008 Operation Phantom Phoenix was launched in an attempt to eradicate the remnants of al-Qaeda network following the Diala province campaign between 2006 and 2007.
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