Growing trade between Turks and Kurds

Washington Times:

Growing tensions between Turkey and Kurds in control of northern Iraq belie a deepening cooperation, as Turkish companies, workers and goods flock to a market enriched by 17 percent of Iraq's oil revenues.

Stocked almost entirely with Turkish brands, upmarket Iraqi Kurdish supermarkets only differ from their counterparts north of the border in their taste for gaudy decoration.

Once the preserve of two-story family houses, the suburbs of Iraqi Kurdish cities are increasingly home to the high-rise blocks characteristic of Turkey.

"Turkey is by far and away our most important trading partner," says Aziz Ibrahim Abdo, general director at the Ministry of Trade in the Iraqi Kurdish capital Irbil. "You can see that by looking around you."

The statistics back him up, too. In Irbil, 380 out of 500 foreign companies are Turkish. In Dohuk, a city farther west, 65 percent of contracts worth about $350 million so far this year have gone to Turkish companies.

Worth another $350 million and $300 million, respectively, brand new airports in Irbil and Sulaimaniyah are Turkish products.

Another Turkish company won a $260 million bid to build a new university campus in Sulaimaniyah.

"The quality of Turkish work is good, and they're much more trustworthy than the Iranians," said Ibrahim Sofy, deputy head of Irbil's Chamber of Commerce.

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No kidding. With all of this commerce, it is pretty clear why the threats of an invasion by Turkey make little to no sense. What you have to wonder is why Turkey cannot get along with its own Kurds as well as it does the Iraqi ones.