The Shabak, from the north of Iraq, are a minority group of Iraq with their own religion and language. As with all of the north of Iraq, the Shabak region was a military target of the Kurdish militant Peshmerage. Being a smaller community, the Shabak has been exposed to the intimidation, assassination and suppression much more than the larger communities of the region: the Arabs, the Turkmen, the Chaldea-Assyrians and Yazidis

At 17:00 on Saturday, July 13th, 2008, Mr. Abbas Kadhim, a member of the Shabak Assembly, was returning home after participating in a conference about the upcoming election. At the crossroads of the village Omar Qabchi, 10 km from the center of the sub-district Bashiqa, he was attacked by an armed group with machine-guns, and killed. Mr. Kadhim is the father of five. Kurdish Peshmerges' checkpoints are scattered along the road.

According to Mr. al-Qaddo, head of Iraq's Minorities Council, General Secretary of the Democratic Shabak Assembly, and the Shabak representative in the Iraqi Parliament, Mr. Kadhim was threatened by members of the Kurdish Militant Peshmerages, Mohammed Khalil, Salim Cuma and Thannun Yunus, from the Kurdistan Democratic Party. He was threatened with death if he did not stop his campaigning activities against Kurdish parties and interests over telephone. Mr. Kadhim had filed formal complaints in court.

Mr. Kadhim was a tenacious opponent against the Kurdification processes of the region and its annexation to so-called Kurdistan. He played an important role during meetings with Mr. Steffan de Mistura, UN office in Baghdad by presenting critical information about the Kurdification processes and violation of human rights in the Hamdaniya region. The resulting report of the UN Office in Baghdad on the disputed areas recommended that Hamdaniya region be annexed to Mosul and the Kurdification processes stopped.

Nowadays, the UN envoy is visiting the Bashiqa region to prepare a second report on the disputed areas. Mr. Kadhim was to play an important role in presenting to the UN envoy information on the violations of human rights by the Kurdish Parties and militants, and the demographic changes imposed on the region by the Kurdish parties in attempting to annex the region to Kurdistan.

Bashiqa is a sub-district of the Mosul central district. It is located 25 -- 30 km northwest of Mosul city on the road to Akar. The Shabak comprises about 60% of the sub-district's population. The rest are Yazidis, Chaldea-Assyrians, Arabs and Turkmen. There are few Kurdish villages in the sub-district. Despite the fact that there are almost no Kurds in Bashiqa city, 50% of the city council members are from the Kurdish community, highlighting gross manipulation of election processes in the region.

As with many regions in northern Iraq, the Kurdish Peshmerages controlled the Bashiqa region after the occupation and began the Kurdification processes of the administration in preparation for the annexation of the region to Kurdistan. Today, in addition the Kurdified administration, there are a large numbers of centers of the Kurdish militants.

To stop further political killings and to prepare a conductive environment for the investigations on the disputed areas by the UN, the Iraqi government, the UN and occupation authorities should:

• Replace the Kurdified administration in the cities of the disputed regions, with an administration that reflects the local population distribution.
• Remove the Kurdish militants Peshmerages and replace them with the Iraqi Army

Iraqi Turkmen Human Rights Research Foundation