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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – A young man who became the symbol of defiance against the Iraqi forces in Kirkuk by taking the Iraqi flag down from a police vehicle has said that he was ready to die trying to make a statement.
A video that has been widely shared on the Kurdish social media shows a young man jumping on a vehicle of the Iraqi police force in Kirkuk. Although the vehicle was moving and filled with armed police officers, the young man was able to take the Iraqi flag down.
The incident happened as a group of people were protesting against the Iraqi forces who drove out the Kurdish Peshmerga in Kirkuk.
“Before going to take the flag down, I said to myself that either I take down the Iraqi flag or I will die,” the young man told Rudaw via phone from Kirkuk. Rudaw will not reveal his name for safety concerns.
He said he took the risky move “because we never accepted to be subjugated. When the Kurds die, they should die for the Kurdish flag and land.”
Asked whether he was not fearful for his life as he attempted to defy the Iraqi forces, he said he was ready to make the sacrifice.
“I was not afraid of them at all, because one dies only once. It is very normal for me to die, because you die only once, and it is nice to die while your head is high.”
He said that they had seen too much humiliation at the hands of the Hashd al-Shaabi forces, and as the people of Rahimawa, a neighborhood in Kirkuk, they will not accept that. Iraq denies the accusations.
Iraqi forces took control of Kirkuk and vast areas from the Kurdish Peshmerga on Monday. Dozens of eyewitnesses Rudaw spoke with via telephone, and those who have fled the tensions in the city, have accused the mainly Shiite Hashd al-Shaabi of abuse, and disrespecting the Kurdish flag.
The Iraqi forces ordered his security forces to take the Kurdish flag down on Monday, while raising the Iraqi one.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi ordered all armed forces, except for the local police and the US-trained Counter Terrorism Service, to leave the urban areas in the Kirkuk province.
The Iraqi forces, and the interim governor, said on Wednesday that the situation is under control and they want the people who fled the Monday operation, and the subsequent events, to head back home.
The United Nation also reported that more than 60,000 people fled the situation in Kirkuk.
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