Iraq

Exodus from Kurdengebieten

In Kurdish Northern Iraq, run people, tons of them. Out of fear of the IS and because the economy lies on the ground. Also the Integration of returnees from Europe is failed. By Birgit Svensson/Erbil.

In Kurdish Iraq, are increasingly despair. The boom years, as the houses are literally in the sky shot, are over. The Autonomous Region of Iraq slips deeper and deeper into the crisis. “It’s bad“, answers the traders at the Bazaar in the Kurdenmetropole Erbil. “As bad as ever“. Actually, everyone wants to only way. Habib wants to return to Bavaria, where he for nine years has lived before 2011, he in his returned home. Now he exchanges the Euro against the dollar or Iraqi Dinar, is with cigarette lighters and Islamic prayer beads.

In Erbil waiting for the dealer is usually free to customers

Marwan sold dates, pomegranates and grapes, and would rather be back in the Pizzeria in Berlin-Neukölln to work. Fauwzi dreams of his apartment in Duisburg, which he had abandoned after his family no peace gave, and persuaded him to Erbil to return. The rent for his Shop in the yellow Brick newly designed arcades, he can hardly pay. “Nobody has money, nobody buys anything.“ Some shops have already had to close. The owners are either fled or bust.

Population is shrinking rapidly

At the General meeting of the Association of the German school in Erbil, the Trend is even clearer. The only German school in Iraq recorded for the current year a decline in enrollment by 34 percent compared to the same period last year. It is estimated that alone in the last six months of 35,000 Kurds of Iraq in the direction of Europe – and the Trend continues. Even the mayor of Erbil, Nihad Latif Qoja, after ten years of the term of office back to Bonn.

After the end of the second Iraq war, it drew thousands of Kurds from the European exile and in their homeland. Especially from Germany sat down to 2011a veritable Rückkehrerboom. With an estimated half a Million Iraqi Kurds, the Federal Republic of Germany, the largest Kurdish community in the Diaspora. Who volunteered in Iraq went back, got money and a Freiflugticket to Erbil what the home is still tempting made. However, many of the returnees regret this now deeply and try again to enter Europe. The Kurdish television channel KNN reported just last week that in the Aegean sea, a boat with refugees from Kurdistan has fallen. 30 of them are drowned. All of Suleimanija, the second largest city in Iraqi Kurdengebiet.

Resistance against mismanagement

Of all places, from Suleimanija. The city is actually the safest cities in Iraq. It is located about 200 kilometres from the area of influence of the so-called Islamic state (IS) away, near the border with Iran. Suleimanija regarded as a cultural and educational center of Kurdistan. The attack of the Terrormiliz on the Kurdengebiete in August 2014 had the 1.6 million inhabitants only of Relatives or friends from Erbil heard or seen from the media. Only two camps for internally displaced persons on the outskirts of the city reflect the reality Restiraks reflected. But it Suleimanija from what is now everywhere in Kurdistan to attack: the resistance against the prevailing conditions.

Protests of young Kurds in October 2015

Especially young Kurds complain about no work and no future in the Region. As at the beginning of the Arab spring of 2011 took to the streets to against mismanagement and corruption of the Kurdish regional government, and for more democracy and a parliamentary System to demonstrate, the protests brutally suppressed. Five people were killed. Kurdenpräsident Masoud Barzani, blamed the opposition party, Goran, in Suleimanija was responsible for it. He threw their members without further ADO, from the government, a ban on the speakers entry to Erbil and asked the deputies to cold.

Regional government is virtually bankrupt

Since the summer of last year, this is Barzanis term of office officially ended. The representatives of the people should be in line with the Constitution a new President. But there is no more talk. The like as the vanguard of a democratic development, giving the Iraqi Kurds fall into archaic, authoritarian structures. Add to that a massive economic crisis. In the last five months, the salaries of civil servants not paid – more than 70 percent of the Kurds in the three provinces of Erbil, Dohuk and Suleimanija are state-employees. The result are empty of shops, Restaurants and Hotels.

In the lavish shopping areas-lack of customers. Power outages are the rule. Infrastructure projects are on hold, foreign Oil companies have the Region to leave because they can no longer be paid. A profound dispute between the Kurdish regional government and the Central government in Baghdad to stop the transfers. Alone can take the Region but not Finance. Especially since the fight against the IS and the care of the many refugees the Budget extreme stress.

Accusations against Germany-returnees

“The Kurds don’t fall into the archaic structures of Mesopotamia back. They have these really never leave,“ expresses Khoshawe Farag his pessimistic view on the current plight. The Politikdozent at the University of Suleimanija six years ago from Stuttgart, Germany to Kurdistan, has returned. “We had full of enthusiasm in building our Region and the modernization of our society, helped,“ he says. His wife and three daughters nod in agreement. Now sitting the family on the Sofa of her four-room apartment in a concrete-style neighbourhood Suleimanijas and thinking about a renewed flight to Germany.

Family Farag: daughter Yarivan and father Khoshawe in Suleimanija

Also, because the Kurdish society is not properly integrated. From the beginning they have a large rejection felt, remembers the eldest daughter of your first impressions after your return in the for you at that time almost unknown in Kurdistan. Yarivan was three years old when the parents decided that leaving Iraq. You was 15 when you came back. “We were seen as competition, it to fend off galt.“ Sometimes would the Locals even openly, what about the returnees thought: “you have a nice life in Europe. We have against Saddam Hussein fought, and now you come back and want to have a say.“

“A veritable brainwashing“

Such reservations are also in the schools to observe. There, two factions are formed: returnees and long-Established. Different world views collide there collide. Yarivan had to learn that much of what in Germany is the norm in their home is prohibited. So are Cycling and Swimming for girls is a taboo. About skirt length will be endlessly discussed. As about Make-Up, the headscarf and that girls and boys should not be seen together. “It is a real brainwashing,“ sums up Yarivan your impressions together. May has of Islamism in the Iraqi Kurdengebieten also of resistance against the secular-educated returnees to influence.