Iraqi Kurd armies to aid Allies in bid to rebuff Turkey

Iraqi Kurds agreed yesterday that their 100,000 soldiers would co-operate with the United States-led coalition as hundreds of thousands of people fled the Kurdish capital, Arbil, fearing a chemical attack.

Meanwhile, the Turkish parliament is to consider today whether to grant the US military the right to use Turkish air space in the Iraq war. Under the agreement, the US would not be able to use Incirlik air base, a sprawling facility that already houses 50 American fighters used to patrol a no-fly zone over Iraq. Turkish officials said the latest resolution would allow Turkish troops to enter northern Iraq. Washington has so far failed to convince Turkey not to cross into Iraqi Kurdistan.

Arbil was plunged into darkness last night when the electricity was cut off – presumably by the Iraqi government. Most shops had already closed as their owners took refuge in mountain villages far from the front line.

There were few overt signs of military preparation apart from peshmerga – Kurdish soldiers – pitching tents outside the city. American special forces have joined other peshmerga to make forays behind Iraqi lines, but the Kurdish forces will not come under direct US command.

In the run-up to war, leaders of the two Kurdish parties, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), have been negotiating in the Turkish capital, Ankara, in an attempt to prevent Turkish troops entering northern Iraq. The Kurds, part of an Iraqi opposition delegation which they dominate, want to use their leverage with the US to prevent or at least limit a Turkish incursion.

The Kurdish negotiating position was strengthened when Turkey turned down a request from America to use the country as a launch-pad for a land invasion of northern Iraq. This has left the US more reliant on the 62,000-strong army of the KDP and the 40,000 PUK fighters. Jalal Talabani, the leader of the PUK, said last night that a broad measure of agreement had been reached.

Previously, the Kurdish leaders had threatened that there would be military clashes if the Turks entered Iraqi Kurdistan – which has had de facto independence since 1991 – even if the soldiers were part of a coalition force.

Kamran Karadaghi, a veteran commentator on Kurdish affairs, said: "I think the Turks will cross the border but not come as far as we feared and the Kurdish reaction will be less than they threatened."

The fate of Kirkuk, the northern Iraqi oil province, is crucial. Kurds were once in the majority here before Saddam Hussein ethnically cleansed the area. Kurdish leaders have pledged that 300,000 Kurdish refugees will return, evicting the Arab settlers who replaced them. Turkey is adamant that the Kurds must not get Kirkuk, whose oil wealth might be the basis for an independent state.

Turkey is supporting the rights of the Turkoman minority, also expelled from Kirkuk by President Saddam. Mr Karadaghi said: "It is important that there are no clashes between the returning Turkomans and Kurds."

Kurdish military commanders say they are under orders not to attack the cities of Mosul and Kirkuk, but to take the surrounding countryside. Over the next week there is likely to be an uprising by Kurds living in Iraqi-controlled areas supported by the returning refugees, many of whom are peshmerga.

It will be difficult for the US to prevent this even if it wanted to do so. Kurdish leaders claim that Arab settlers will automatically return to their homes elsewhere in Iraq, but some of them have been in Kirkuk or Mosul for 40 years and have nowhere else to go.

This could have bloody consequences for Arabs in Kirkuk province, some of whom have pledged to remain and fight.

The state of morale of the Iraqi regular army in the north is unclear, but Kurdish military officers believe they will not fight if they are subjected to an intense air bombardment. But one Republican Guard infantry division, the Nebuchadnezzar, is in Kirkuk and it might put up stiffer resistance.

Kurdish officials in Arbil denied reports last night that Tariq Aziz, the Iraqi Deputy Prime Minster, had fled to the city. An earlier report, broadcast by the Iraqi Communist Party, said Mr Aziz, Taha Yassin Ramadan, another politician, and a son of Ali Hassan al-Majid, the Iraqi official in charge of Basra, had been executed.

Mr Aziz later turned up at a press conference in Baghdad to prove that he was neither dead nor a defector. President Saddam has succeeded in preventing important defections from his immediate circle in the run-up to the war. This has been easier than it was during the 1991 Gulf War because few senior Iraqis now travel abroad.