Kurds ( Archived) (4)

The man who would be king of Kurdistan lived the rest of his years in relative obscurity, in a village near the city of Sulaimania, and died in 1956. Despite the errors committed by the valiant warrior - by most accounts, he was not a shrewd politician - Sheikh Mahmud remains an idolised figure and a source of inspiration for Kurdish leaders. An enormous mural-portrait of him lies at the entrance of the Sulaimania bazaar.


Sheik Mahmud Barzinji, with Ahmed Uthman in 1927, Erbil, Iraq
"They say Sheikh Mahmud didn't like the British, but that is not true. They promised him a state, but then they changed their minds and gave the Mosul Vilayet to the Arabs," says Sheikh Salar al-Hafeed, a lawyer and relative of Sheikh Mahmud.

Today, as the Kurds of Iraq, Syria and Turkey play a critical role in the war against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as the only fighting force on the ground, Middle East watchers talk of a new Sykes-Picot in the making.

Some 150,000 Kurdish Peshmerga are on active dutyacross northern Iraq today. They are an integral part of the US-led coalition against ISIL, just as their forefathers were supportive of British forces at the end of World War I, spurred on by disingenuous promises of an independent Kurdish state carved out of an ailing Ottoman Empire.

They say Sheikh Mahmud didn't like the British, but that is not true. They promised him a state, but then they changed their minds and gave the Mosul Vilayet to the Arabs.

Sheikh Salar al-Hafeed, lawyer and relative of Sheikh Mahmud

No official source will confirm whether or not Iraqi Kurdish leaders have been promised an independent state in the event of ISIL's defeat - rumours of an independence deal actually gained momentum around the time of the Arab Spring, some say to appease the Kurdish public - but parallels abound with the conditions on the ground at the turn of the last century.

The line between insurgent and freedom fighter has always been blurry. Revered today as a Kurdish nationalist hero, Sheikh Mahmud was seen as an "insurgent" by the British authorities back in the day.

In 1919, after he was wounded in combat against British imperial forces on the road between Sulaimania and Kirkuk, he was captured and taken to Baghdad to stand trial in a military court.

"During the trial, [the British] refused to acknowledge his status as a Kurdish leader, as a sheikh. They told him, 'You are an obstacle.' They called him the leader of a terrorist group," says Hafeed. "Sheikh Mahmud replied: 'You promised us a Kurdistan.'"

The Kurdish leader was sentenced to death for insurrection, but this was later reduced to imprisonment in a British fort in India for two years.

On his return to Sulaimania in October 1922, Sheikh Mahmud initially had cordial relations with the British, promising to help them clear the Turks out of Kurdish areas. But scarcely a month had passed before promises on both sides were broken and Sheikh Mahmud declared himself king of Kurdistan. An audacious act that did not go down so well with the British Mandate of Iraq.

While the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) has repeatedly expressed gratitude for the US-led coalition's air support for Kurdish ground forces, there are some who fear that Kurdish interests may be betrayed once again by Western powers. Recently, for instance, Peshmerga commanders have magnified their calls for more updated and sophisticated weapons and artillery, saying their arsenal pales in comparison to those in ISIL's possession. With over 2,000 Peshmerga already killed and many others injured - according to official figures - they argue that the war cannot be won if the asymmetry in capability persists.

Hi Chris