The Impacts of the Kurdistan Region Independence Referendum on Iran and Turkey’s Foreign Policy

Abstract

The Kurdish separatism issue has always been one of the major fault lines in the West Asian region, with the potential to be activated at any time. After the emergence of ISIS, the power vacuum in Iraq deepened to the extent that the Kurdistan Region assessed the situation as conducive for holding an independence referendum. Masoud Barzani, then President of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, after years of effort, was ultimately able to garner considerable support among various Kurdish factions for implementing the scenario of establishing an independent Kurdish state. The successful execution of such a scenario could have triggered another wave of violence and instability based on ethnic differences in the West Asian region. The collapse of the bipolar world order led to two waves of regional instability globally. The first wave, occurring in the early 1990s, cast its shadow over the geographical areas south and west of the former Soviet Union, such as Central Asia, the Caucasus, the Balkans, and Eastern Europe. Gradually, these areas came under control and achieved relative stability. The second wave destabilized the Middle East, especially in the early 21st century, and continues to persist with increasing intensity.

This instability stems from the confrontation between two major actors: on one side, an extra-regional actor, specifically the United States, aiming to control the affairs of this geographical space, and on the other side, regional actors comprising a collection of some states, nations, and organized groups that are not necessarily aligned or unified. This phenomenon partially reflects what Huntington referred to as the "clash of Western and Islamic civilizations." The outcome of this confrontation is the proliferation of crises in the Middle East and the transformation of its geopolitical processes. Specific examples of these crises include the Palestine-Israel-Lebanon conflict, the Kurdish issue, the Iraq crisis, the Afghanistan conflict, the security crisis in Pakistan, the Iran-U.S. confrontation, the legitimacy issues of governments, the spread of fundamentalist ideologies, the development of Arab-Turkish-Iranian rifts—or what can be described as the triangular rift—the crisis of insecurity and terrorism, among others. These crises have the potential to fuel further instability, insecurity, and transformation. This study aims to conduct a comparative analysis of Iran and Turkey’s foreign policy concerning the Kurdistan Region’s independence referendum, offering a distinct perspective on the Kurdish issue in Iraq. Given the Kurdistan Region's geo-strategic and geo-political significance, any changes in the Kurdistan Region could have significant impacts on Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and the Middle Eastern policies of extra-regional powers.