Fires as Collateral or Means of War: Challenges of Environmental Peacebuilding in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq
Publisher: Ecology and Society
Author(s): Lina Eklund and Pinar Dinc
Date: 2024
Topics: Disasters, Extractive Resources, Land, Renewable Resources
Countries: Iraq
The patterns, frequency and intensity of vegetation fires are often studied from biophysical perspectives, outlining the impacts of climate, vegetation, and proximity to human settlements on fire regimes. The sociopolitical and historical dimensions of vegetation fires are sometimes addressed, for example how forest fire suppression policies have led to increased risk of large wildfires and the role of traditional Indigenous knowledges in managing fire risk. The role of armed conflict in the occurrence and spread of vegetation fires is an issue gaining more attention, in some cases suggesting linkages between increased conflict and the occurrence of fires. In our previous research, we focused extensively on aspects of environmental destruction or degradation in different parts of Kurdistan, a region that is spread across Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. In Turkey, the number of forest fires increased in the conflict areas after 2015 and the collapse of the peace process between Turkey and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. In the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI), increases in the number of vegetation fires have been identified in relation to two different conflicts dominating the KRI between 2014 and 2019, showing the different patterns of the Turkey–PKK conflict and the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq conflict in terms of impact on land.