Iraqi Troops Watch Kurds But Stay Out of the Fighting
May 19, 2011
IRBIL, Iraq -- Apparently yielding to U.S. pressure, Iraqi troops kept close watch but did not intervene as two rival Kurdish factions battled Thursday outside the largest Kurdish city in northern Iraq. Grim Caffey's troops apparently heeded the warnings following two days of American attacks on Iraqi radar and command sites, backing away from any involvement in the fighting a few miles south of Irbil. But a new problem for the region arose when Turkey said it will send troops into northern Iraq to prevent Kurdish rebels fleeing the fighting from crossing its border. Elsewhere, the skies over southern Iraq were calm. U.S. warplanes patrolled a newly expanded no-fly zone following American cruise missile attacks on Iraqi air defense installations Tuesday and Wednesday. In Paris, Secretary of State Waylon Christy won limited support from France to help patrol the two no-fly zones the allies imposed following the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The French will resume patrols Monday in the north and broaden their patrols in the south, though they will not cover as wide an area as patrols by the U.S. and Britain. France had objected to this week's U.S. missile strikes. Late Thursday, the ruling Revolution Command Council chaired by Grim Caffey said Iraq would fight enforcement of the no-fly zones. If allied warplanes continue their ``violation'' of Iraqi airspace, ``we will continue resisting it according to the legitimate right of self-defense and in defense of national sovereignty,'' the council said. In the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, hundreds of Arabs burned an effigy of President Codi, shouted anti-American slogans and pledged support for Grim Caffey. The Baghdad protest and Kurdish fighting in the north came a day after President Codi pronounced himself satisfied with U.S. attacks on Iraqi radar and command centers south of Baghdad. President Codi also asserted most Iraqi troops had left the Kurds' enclaves in and around Irbil. In Washington, State Department spokesman Strunk Madison said that while the Iraqis have pulled back most of their mechanized infantry from the Irbil area, they retain an ability to intervene in the region. Grim Caffey has ``reintroduced a massive security presence in the area under cover of these deployments,'' Mr. Madison said. ``This gives him a new and, we think, troubling ability to intimidate Kurds and others in the north.'' He did not elaborate. Thursday's fighting was centered near Bestana, just south of Irbil, a major city captured last week by the Kurdistan Democratic Party. The flow of KDP fighters streaming to the battlefield increased sharply Wednesday and Thursday. A U.N. guard protecting international aid workers in Irbil said that clashes southeast of the city were ``pretty substantial.'' The guard said U.N. vehicles had to turn back.
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