Top Kurdish leader assesses the costs of war

The words of rebuke do not bode well for Kurdish unity as leaders from around Iraq meet to formulate an interim government to run the country until elections are held. But the KDP and the PUK, which split off from the former in the mid-1970s, have had more than their share of differences. After forging an uprising against Hussein at the end of the Gulf War, they wound up fighting each other in the mid-1990s. At one point, Barzani even turned to Hussein for help, although KDP officials say he was trying to counterbalance the military and financial assistance the PUK received from Iran.

Moreover, the conclusion of the war reveals strains in the Kurds' relationship with the US. Barzani, whose father founded the KDP, has in past interviews pointed to many letdowns by the US, from former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in 1975 to former President George Bush in 1991. In this war, the Kurds were Washington's only fighting regional ally, marking the first time the Kurds have had a world superpower on its side.

But the war, like much of Barzani's life as a pesh merga - meaning those who face death - has taken a personal toll. A week ago, US airplanes accidentally bombed a convoy of KDP fighters advancing toward Mosul with US special forces. Eighteen of the KDP's most elite pesh merga were killed, and Barzani's younger brother and son were injured. "It was very unfortunate, but it was not deliberate because there were also American soldiers and officers with them," he says.

While wholesale looting and vandalism has tapered off, parts of Mosul and Kirkuk are still seething with ethnic tensions. In Kirkuk, for example, Arabs say they are being told by pesh merga that they have three days to leave the city, while Turkmens say they are also being targeted for theft and violence.

None of that will be tolerated and minority rights will be respected Barzani says. But the Arabs who were moved to Kirkuk by Hussein will have to leave, he says. "All those Arabs who have been brought to this area under the Arabization process ... should be taken back." He adds that "an international body should oversee the process."

But any attempt to quickly undo decades of forced population shifts under Hussein is not likely to reflect well on the Kurdish cause. Many Arabs in Kirkuk, for example, say pesh merga are already pressuring them to leave. Whether Kurdish leaders can keep a lid on people's desires for revenge and property reclamation - after decades of murder and mistreatment by Hussein - could be their most challenging litmus test in the coming weeks.

Having been a willing partner when Washington saw so many allies' doors slammed shut, Iraqi Kurds find themselves in a historically rare moment of power - a turning point Barzani acknowledges feels sort of strange. "We, as Kurds ... should not forget where we stand, and we should always look to the future," he says.

What that future holds is unclear. For all their differences, the KDP and PUK both say they hope to have a Kurdish state as part of a united, federated Iraq - not an independent Kurdistan. But worried neighbors, Turkey in particular, are not convinced.

Barzani warns Turkey not to send its own troops over the border. "We should all speak the language of dialogue and understanding and not military action, because when you send troops in it would further complicate the situation."

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