The view from Erbil: Lizzie Porter
In the lanes of Erbil’s Qaysari bazaar, by the city’s ancient citadel, Ali Karim shares halva, a sesame sweet, as he discusses with his customers the fallout from Iraqi Kurdistan’s independence referendum. “The situation is not good at all. For three months there has been no money. How can we live? The US got rid of Saddam Hussein, but if you look at Baghdad now, we have 20 Saddams.”
The semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq is relatively prosperous and safe. But since the referendum on 25th September, it has been rocked by economic strife and violence. Outraged by the Kurdish authorities’ decision to hold the vote, Iraq retaliated. It closed the Kurdistan region’s two airports to international flights and pushed for control of border crossings with Syria and Turkey. It also began military operations to regain ground held by Kurdish Peshmerga troops since they halted Islamic State (IS) advances in 2014. That territory included the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, which Iraq retook from the Kurds on 16th October.