The Kurds: A Contemporary Overview

212 Pages·2005·1.39 MB·English

The Kurds
The position of the 19 million Kurds is an extremely complex one. Their territory
is divided between 5 sovereign states, none of which has a Kurdish majority.
They speak widely divergent dialects, and are also divided by religious
affiliations and social factors. It has taken the tragic and horrifying events in Iraq
this year to bring the Kurds to the centre of the world stage, but their particular
problems, and their considerable geo-political importance, have been the source
of growing concern and interest during the last two to three decades.
There is a remarkable dearth of reliable and up-to-date information about the
Kurds, which this book remedies. Its contributors cover social and political
issues, legal questions, religion, language, and the modern history of the Kurds in
Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Syria and the Soviet Union. The Kurds will be an invaluable
source of reference for students and specialists in Middle East studies, and those
concerned with wider questions of nationalism and cultural identity. It also offers
extremely useful background information for those with a professional concern
for the numerous Kurdish immigrants and asylum seekers in Western Europe and
North America.
Routledge/SOAS Politics and Culture in the Middle East
Series
Edited by Tony Allan, Centre for Near and Middle Eastern Studies, School of
Oriental and African Studies
Egypt under Mubarak
Edited by Charles Tripp and Roger Owen
Turkish State, Turkish Society
Edited by Andrew Finkel and Nukhet Sirman
Modern Literature in the Middle East
Edited by Robin Ostle
Sudan under Nimeiri
Edited by Peter Woodward
The Kurds
A Contemporary Overview
Edited by Philip G.Kreyenbroek and Stefan Sperl
London and New York
First published 1992
by Routledge
11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001
Reprinted 1995, 1997, 2000
© 1992 Philip G.Kreyenbroek and Stefan Sperl
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
ªTo purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge's collection of
thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.º
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission
in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
The Kurds: a contemporary overview.
1. Kreyenbroek, Philip G., 1948±
II. Sperl, Stefan, 1950±
305.89159
ISBN 0-203-99341-1 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-415-07265-4 (Print Edition)
Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of
Congress
To all Kurds forced to leave their homeland as refugees
Contents
List of contributors viii
Editors' preface ix
Introduction 1
Sami Zubaida
1 The Kurdish question: a historical review 8
David McDowall
2 Kurdish society, ethnicity, nationalism and refugee problems 26
Martin van Bruinessen
3 On the Kurdish language 53
Philip G.Kreyenbroek
4 Humanitarian legal order and the Kurdish question 65
Jane Connors
5 Political aspects of the Kurdish problem in contemporary 74
Turkey
Hamit Bozarslan
6 The situation of Kurds in Iraq and Turkey: current trends 90
and prospects
Munir Morad
7 The Kurdish movement in Iraq: 1975±88 105
A.Sherzad
8 The Kurds in Syria and Lebanon 112
Ismet Chériff Vanly
9 The development of nationalism in Iranian Kurdistan 135
Fereshteh Koohi-Kamali
10 The Kurds in the Soviet Union 152
Ismet Chériff Vanly
Notes 173
vii
Bibliography 187
Index 194
Contributors
Hamit Bozarslan is a Member of the Equipe de Recherches sur la Turquie et
l'Iran contemporain, CERI, Paris.
Martin van Bruinessen is a frequent visitor to Kurdistan and a well-known
specialist on Kurdish affairs.
Jane Connors is a lecturer in the Law Department of SOAS, London. Kurdish
affairs are among her special fields of interest.
Fereshteh Koohi-Kamali is an Oxford-trained specialist in the modern
history of the Middle East generally, and of the Kurds in particular.
Philip G.Kreyenbroek is Lecturer in Modern Iranian Languages at SOAS; he
is currently working on religious movements in Kurdistan, and on oral
traditions in Iranian languages.
David McDowall is a specialist in Middle Eastern affairs, and author of
several publications on the Kurds and the Palestinians.
Munir Morad is a Member of the Centre of Near and Middle Eastern Studies,
SOAS.
A.Sherzad is a Kurdish researcher currently studying the influence of
`modernity' on Kurdish culture and politics.
Stefan Sperl is currently Lecturer in Arabic at SOAS; he worked for UNHCR
for ten years, and has a special interest in Kurdish refugees.
Ismet Chériff Vanly has represented the Kurdish people at an international
level for many decades, and has published widely on Kurdish affairs.
Sami Zubaida, a well-known specialist in Middle Eastern affairs, lectures at
Birkbeck College, London.
Editors' preface
The aim of this volume, which contains articles about major aspects of the life
and recent history of the Kurds by leading scholars, is to introduce the reader to
the plight of the Kurdish people, and to generate greater understanding and
support for the many Kurds who have been forced to abandon their homelands in
recent years.
Most of the papers in this book were originally presented at an orientation
seminar on the Kurdish problem organized in June 1989 for a group of United
Nations Staff members by Dr Sperl and the External Services Division of the
School of Oriental and African Studies, London (SOAS). The papers have since
been revised and updated by the authors. Other contributions, in particular those
on Turkey, Syria and the Soviet Union, have been especially commissioned for
this volume.
In a book of this type transliteration is a major problem, as different
conventions are normally used to transliterate Arabic, Kurdish, Persian and
Turkish. The editors have sought to achieve some degree of consistency, but it
proved impossible to reach complete uniformity. The use of diacritical signs has
been kept to a minimum, and in some cases preferences of individual
contributors have been respected.
The editors would like to extend their special thanks to Professor Tony Allan
and to Ms Diana Matias, without whose help and encouragement the project would
not have been realized. We also received much valuable help in editing the
papers from Ms Jane Connors, and from Mr George Joffe, Dr Bengisu Rona and
Mr Eralp Alişik. Some of the publication costs were met by the SOAS Research
and Publications Committee and the SOAS Middle East Centre. The final
typescript was compiled with the help of Ms Diana Gur and Ms Fiona McEwan
of the Middle East Centre. We are very grateful for their expertise and for their
unfailing good humour in dealing with the text.
NOTE
The material in this volume reflects the opinions of the contributors. Officials of
the School of Oriental and African Studies, where the material appearing here
was coordinated and edited, do not necessarily share the views expressed.