Title: The Kurdish and Iraqi counter-quests for nationhood and the transformation of Iraqi Kurdistan into a quasi-state.
Author: Aram Rafaat
Place of publication: Australia
Publisher: University of Adelaide
Release date: 2013
This thesis addresses the protracted Iraqi-Kurdish conflict that has been plagued the country since the incorporation of the Kurdish region into the newly created Iraq in the 1920s. Rejecting the legitimacy of the Kurdish annexation since the beginning, Kurdish nationalists rejected Iraqi rule in Kurdistan and
portrayed Iraq as an occupier rather than legitimate ruler. The ‘liberation of Kurdistan’ from ‘Iraqi occupation’ became the main objective of the Kurdish nationalist movement (Kurdayeti) since the formative years of Iraq. Kurdayeti manifested itself as an alternative to Iraqi nationalism. Kurdayeti created Kurdish political parties as autonomous political entities outside of Iraqi control and monopolised the political sphere in Kurdistan. Advocating for the Kurdish quest for nationhood, Kurdayeti challenged the Iraqi quest for a unitary state that insisted upon Iraqi state sovereignty over all of Iraq.
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