Kurds Iraq

President Saddam Hussein's regime has expelled hundreds of ethnic Kurds and other non-Arab minorities to Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq in recent months despite repeated warnings from the U.N., officials say. Tens of thousands were forced to leave oil-rich areas under the Iraqi leader's control after the end of the Persian Gulf War in 1991, but the expulsions then slowed. The daily deportations have increased again in the past six months.

Hoping to help rebuild an opposition movement in Iraq, the Clinton administration is bringing the leaders of two rival Iraqi Kurdish factions to Washington for face-to-face talks aimed at ending their conflict. A meeting between Massoud Barzani of the Kurdistan Democratic Party and Jalal Talabani of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan is expected to take place within the next two weeks. The U.S.

Directed by Congress to pursue more vigorous efforts to bring down Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, the Clinton administration has responded with a detailed, 27-page plan to rebuild Iraq's shattered political opposition and prepare a case for a possible war crimes indictment of Iraqi leaders.

Seventeen months after Iraqi troops poured into this Kurdish enclave, Iraqi Arabs are again arriving in the northern region in droves. This time, however, they're coming as tourists. The sight of such visitors in the self-declared regional administration of Iraqi Kurdistan would have been unthinkable until recently. But contradictory U.S.

Fierce fighting raged in northern Iraq for a second consecutive day Sunday amid conflicting reports of territorial gains by a Kurdish militia and its Turkish-backed rival. "This morning at about 4 o'clock they launched two new offensives in Degala and were repulsed," Shazad Saib, Ankara spokesman for the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, or PUK, said.

A Kurdish faction said its rival had launched major attacks as the U.S. and its allies continued their efforts to bring the Kurdish conflict to a halt. "PUK [Patriotic Union of Kurdistan] forces launched two attacks on KDP [Democratic Party of Kurdistan] positions this morning," a KDP spokesman said. A spokesman for the PUK had no confirmation of the clashes. Renewed fighting broke out between the groups earlier this month after a year's peace brokered by the West.

Fierce fighting raged between rival Kurdish groups in northeastern Iraq on several fronts in the buffer zone separating their militias, the United Nations said. U.N. spokesman Eric Falt described the situation as "serious" but declined comment on whether the fighting was hampering distribution of humanitarian supplies under Iraq's oil-for-food deal with the U.N.

The military acknowledged Friday that Kurdish rebels downed two helicopters in northern Iraq with missiles, killing 13 soldiers. The crashes had been blamed on mechanical failures. Gen. Erol Ozkasnak, secretary-general of Turkey's joint chiefs of staff, said the rebels used Russian-made SA-7 shoulder-fired missiles from the former Soviet republic of Armenia. One helicopter was downed this week, the other last month.

Turkey has shrugged off pleas from Baghdad and its own NATO allies to cut short its anti-guerrilla campaign in northern Iraq, ferrying in more men, food and supplies to augment more than 10,000 troops used in a May 14 offensive. State-run Anatolian news agency said more than 1,300 Kurdish fighters had been killed so far. A Germany-based news agency said the Turkish military had suffered "heavy losses."

An Iraqi Kurdish militia, emboldened by an alliance with Turkish troops, drove fellow Kurds out of a key northern city in battles that left more than 100 dead, an Iraqi opposition group said. A spokesman for the Iraqi National Congress said the Kurdistan Democratic Party, or KDP, overran all six offices of Turkey's Kurdistan Workers Party in Irbil over the weekend.