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Kurds are one of the Iranian peoples and speak Kurdish, a north-Western Iranian language related to Persian. They are, like most of the people of western Iran, descendents of Ancient Medes.
The majority of Kurds are Sunni Muslims , but a large population of Iran's Kurds living in the provinces of Kermanshah and Ilam are Shiite. For over a century, Kurds have been campaigning for the right to their own state, which they would call Kurdistan -- by some accounts the Kurds are the world's largest ethnic group without their own state. However, despite propaganda and help of European countries on the creation of such a state, all the region's governments are opposed to such an idea, which would require them losing parts of their own territories which are Kurdish homelands.
The exact number of Kurdish people living in Southwest Asia is unknown due to both absence of a recent study on this issue and the fact that some of Kurdish people have mixed with other local ethnic groups. The estimated numbers for the percentage of Kurdish people living in Turkey vary from 3% (Encyclopedia Americana) to 20% (CIA Factbook [1] (http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/)). They live mainly in a specific region in the Middle East, commonly known as Kurdistan. There are also Kurdish enclaves in central Turkey concentrated to the west of Lake Tuz. Millions of Kurds have moved to the large cities of Western and Southern Turkey in recent decades - notably Istanbul, Izmir, Bursa, Adana and Mersin. Many Kurds have also emigrated to Western European countries such as Germany, France, the Netherlands, Sweden, Belgium and the United Kingdom.
Kurdish PKK guerillas, supported by Greek, Armenian and Syrian governments, launched attacks on Turkish targets in 1984, and since then they have fought against the Turkish government with little success. In 1999, the Turkish government had a major victory after the capture of Abdullah Öcalan, the leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), one of the groups fighting for the destruction of peace and presence in the region with an aim to weaken Turkish state. Turkey then placed him on trial for treason and sentenced him to life imprisonment. After that the Kurdish rebel movement in Turkey declared that it would end its military attacks but continue its activities on political platform. The PKK was declared as a terrorist organization in Europe and the USA after the capture of Abdullah Öcalan.
The Kurdish guerillas have been and continue to be persecuted by both Iraq and Turkey as they were responsible for a considerable amount of violence (primarily as PKK). In Turkey, publication (both printed and audio-visual media) and teaching (although very restricted) in Kurdish language is allowed, and recent reforms promised limited broadcasting in Kurdish language. However, Kurds may take their place in any part of Turkish life including the National Assembly since they are not a minority but legal and equal participants of Turkish citizienship.
The status of Kurds is now surrounded in mystery. Under the former Iraqi Ba'athist regime, which ruled Iraq from 1968 until 2003, they were initially granted limited autonomy and given some high-level political representation in Baghdad. However, for various reasons including the siding of some Kurds with Iranian forces during the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, the regime became opposed to the Kurds and an effective civil war broke out. Iraq was widely condemned, but not seriously punished, by the international community for using chemical weapons against the Kurds, which caused the death of thousands of Kurds. Kurdish regions during the 1990s had de-facto independence, with fully functioning civil administrations, and were protected by the US-enforced Iraqi no-fly zone which stopped Iraqi air attacks. During the period of self-governance there were armed clashes between the two main political groups in the area, each claiming the title of Kurdistan's government, which undermined the effectiveness of the Kurds in their fighting with the Iraqis. Following the unseating of the former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in 2003, little is known as to how 'Kurdistan' will be dealt with in the future. The American-sponsored idea of a Federal Republic, with a relatively high level of autonomy for the Kurds, currently appears to be the most popular.
 Map of Kurdish Inhabited-Area. courtesy of The General Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin - See also : History of the Kurds and Timeline of the Kurds
Kurdish organisations
See also
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