Kurd

A historic Indo-European people numbering 30-40 million inhabiting a region known as Kurdistan since approximately 3000 B.C. First written record of the Kurds was by Xenophon, a general under Alexander the Great, who noted the troubles the Greek army had when crossing the 'Land of Karda' and being confronted by fierce indigenous warriors. Kurdistan was partitioned and annexed into Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria by British colonialist in 1921, after the breakup of the Ottoman empire. This tactical decision was taken in order to allow future manipulation of the Kurdish populations with the aim of destabilise the respective countries. Having been subjected to various attempts of assimilation and genocidal campaigns, most notably by successive Turkish and Iraqi governments, the Kurds have largely persevered; still retaining the burning passion of self-determination they had when first subjected to Islamic colonialism centuries ago. The status quo of the Kurdish region is and has always been directly consequential to stability in the Middle East. Six successive Iraqi regimes were deposed due to Kurdish uprisings. Presently, the capture of a popular Kurdish leader and ostensible reforms in Turkey have largely kept Northern Kurdistan quiet. Southern Kurdistan (Iraq) has had self-determination and de-facto autonomy for the last 13 years, and looks set to because fully autonomous of the makeshift Iraq government taking power in 2005, provided Islamic fundamentalists do not get their way. Repressive measures in Easter (Syria) and western (Iran) Kurdistan have been adopted to keep Kurdish independence from happening, however these have been met by civil unrest and an escalation in riots as seen in Quashmili