Is Kurdish Independence From Iraq Impossible? Or Inevitable?

Iraqi Kurds voted for independence on Monday, a move that generated controversy within their semiautonomous territory of northern Iraq and threats from powerful neighbors Turkey and Iran, and most of all the Iraqi government in Baghdad. All three are bent on preventing any further steps on the road to Kurdish statehood. Some Iraqi Kurds themselves would even have preferred to give priority to economic and political reforms before pushing for full independence. It was easy to come up with many reasons for why the referendum was ill-advised, or why the prospects for true independence will remain poor. All that criticism […]