How Oil Wealth and Terrorism Can Lead to Kurdistan’s Secession

Sep 27, 2017 | Mirna Khaled Abdulaal
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State building is a difficult and expensive task, and in a region currently gripped by perpetual conflict, the possibilities of creating a new state come with stark challenges. As Iraq’s Kurds are today set to cast their votes in an independence referendum, it is topical to look into the impulses that have pushed Kurdistan to follow this path. To start with, the toppling of Saddam Hussein in 2003 is certainly a chief factor. It threw the state into years of sectarian warfare and deeply weakened the central government. This, in turn, had a major impact in reinforcing Kurdish nationalism, and it also put talks of creating a federal government on the table.