The census has been put off until December 5 (File
Iraq's Kurds might boycott the country's already delayed national census if the central government drops a question on ethnic identity, a senior regional official said on Wednesday.
"If a reference to ethnicity is removed from the questionnaire, the region of Kurdistan will probably not participate in the census," said Osman al-Senaidi, planning minister in the autonomous regional government.
"This matter not only concerns Kurd, but also Turkmens and other minorities," he said, adding that removing the question would be in "clear violation of the constitution."
Senaidi was reacting to an article published this week in the As-Sabah daily, in which Baghdad's planning minister, Ali Baban, ventured the possibility of removing the question of ethnicity.
A ministry official confirmed that to AFP, but said any final decision on such a move would be a matter for the cabinet.
On October 3, Iraq again postponed its first census in more than two decades because of political wrangling over disputed areas in the country's north, a deputy minister said Sunday.
The census was put off until December 5, in the latest in a string of deferrals that have consistently put back a count originally due in 2007.
The problem centers mainly on a swathe of land in northern Iraq, in the area of Kirkuk and Nineveh provinces, bordering the autonomous Kurdistan region.
Kurdish authorities claim the land as their own, and Baghdad insists it should be administered by the central government.
There are fears that the dispute, particularly over the fate of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, could trigger open conflict.
To reduce tensions in the disputed area, the U.S. military has been conducting joint patrols and manning checkpoints with Iraqi army and Kurdish Peshmerga forces.
Plans to hold the census in 2007 were scrapped because of nationwide sectarian strife and violence.
The last census, in 1987, counted a total population of 16 million, but international organizations now put the figure at around 30 million.
http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2010/10/20/123012.html
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