Nation-state:

 What is Nation-state?
“A nation-sate is a sovereign state of which most of the citizens or subjects are united also by factors
which defined a nation, such as language or common descent.” (Paleri, 2014)

A nation state is a state in which a great majority shares the same culture and is conscious of it; the
nation-state is an ideal in which cultural boundaries match up with political ones. (Migration and
Inclusive Societies, 2012)

The modern-state usually takes the nation-state. The frontiers of the state are called national frontiers; the
interest of the state is described as national interest; the character of the people of a state is called its
national character. Relations between different states are known as international relations.

At the outset, a nation may be distinguished from nationality. Nationality usually denotes a set of people
inspired by a feeling of unity based on common race, language, religion, culture, geographical
compactness, common political aspirations and historical development. Most of these factors are based on
birth and provide little scope for expanding the horizons of social relationships. Feelings of nationality
separate one set of people from other such sets. Sometimes this is accompanied by a sense of one's own
superiority or a sense of disdain for others which may lead to tensions, wars and other disastrous
consequences. In any case, the feeling of nationality grows from a relatively narrow base. (Gauba, 2009,
p. 142)

It is proclaimed by the nationalists that nation-state is the highest form of political organization, reflecting
it does the principle of sole legitimate unit of political rule. Some writers define nation on the same basis
as nationality and then advocate a separate state for each nationality. This view is no longer held valid. A
nation grows on a much wider base. It refers to people living in a defined territory, inspired by a sense of
unity, common political aspirations, common interests, common history and common destiny though they
may belong to different nationalities. In other words, groups of people of different races, with different
religions, languages and cultures, etc. may live together and feel united as citizens of nation-state.

 Origin and Historical Perspective:

As we know that there is no existence of nation-state or the sentiments of national identity before 1500s.
People never considered themselves as a part of nation; they rarely left their village and mostly unknown
from the larger world. If anything, they identified themselves to the region which they belonged to or to
their lord. At that time, rulers had less control over their countries but the feudal lords enjoy more power
and the kings only were dependent to the goodwill of their subordinates. As Poland could be exemplified
in this context, when it was partitioned by neighboring countries Austria, Prussia and Russia on three
different occasions 1772, 1793, and 1795, because of lack of power held by Monarch rather nobilities.

In the upcoming centuries, the monarchs began to consolidate their power and to unify their people under
a national flag. Not surprisingly, the emergence of some sort of nationalism could be felt in their work
bringing people by the Kings and Queens under a unified rule. It was called Monarch nation-state.
The first light which sparked such sentiments could be traced back to 1469AD when King Ferdinand of
Castile married to Isabella I of Aragon and established a modern state taking back the Grenada from
Moors and uniting Spain in 1492AD.

For over two hundred years the nation has been regarded as the proper, indeed only legitimate, unit of
political rule. This belief has been reflected in the remarkable appeal of nationalism, without doubt the
most influential of the world‟s political creeds during the last two hundred years. Nationalism is, at heart,
the doctrine that each nation is entitled to self-determination, reflected in the belief that, as far as possible,
the boundaries of the nation and those of the state should coincide. Thus the idea of a „nation‟ has been
used as a way of establishing a non-arbitrary basis for the boundaries of the state. This implies that the
highest form of political organization is the nation-state; in effect, the nation, each nation, is a sovereign
entity. (Heywood, 2004, p. 97)

Napoleon Bonaparte was key figure in the development of the nation-state. Amid the chaos of the French
Revolution in the late 18th C. most remaining medieval and feudal laws were overturned and a truly
national law code was established. Similarly, a national military was created. Although, not the only
reason, France‟s status as a nation-state was a key factor in its ability to dominate feudal neighbors in
Italy and Germany. Napoleon‟s military victories also paved the way for the emergence of nation-state in
the rest of Europe: In many places, the people rallied together as a nation in order to defeat Napoleon.
(Nation and States: The Rise of the Nation-State)

 Creation of New Nation-states:

The sentiments of national identity and nation-states evolved intensely during 19th C. peculiarly in
Balkan. Serbia, Bulgaria, Albania and lesser extent Romania and Armenia, which suffered the Ottoman
invasion, were at forefront in this sense. The movements for national identity and independence were
ignited in upcoming decades. Religion had also played a key role with ethnicity. It had led to several
bloody conflict and wars. Ultimately, it inflamed the global warfare and outburst of First World War in
1914 which continued until 1918.

The war ended with the series of treaties and agreements which paved the way to the creation of new
nation-states, particularly in Europe and Balkan region.

The dissolution of the German, Russian, Austro-Hungarian, and Ottoman empires created a number of
new nation-states in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, often with large ethnic minorities. This caused
numerous conflicts and hostilities.

Many new states formed in Eastern Europe, some out of the 1918 Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, where Russia
renounced claims on Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Belarus, Ukraine, and Lithuania, and some from
the various treaties that came out of the Paris Peace Conference of 1919.

Internally these new states tended to have substantial ethnic minorities who wished to unite with
neighboring states where their ethnicity dominated. For example, Czechoslovakia had Germans, Poles,
Ruthenians and Ukrainians, Slovaks, and Hungarians. Many of these national minorities found
themselves in bad situations because the modern governments were intent on defining the national
character of the states, often at the expense of the minorities. The League of Nations sponsored various
Minority Treaties in an attempt to deal with the problem, but with the decline of the League in the 1930s,
these treaties became increasingly unenforceable. One consequence of the massive redrawing of borders
and the political changes in the aftermath of World War I was the large number of European refugees.

Ethnic minorities made the location of the frontiers generally unstable. Where the frontiers have remained
unchanged since 1918, there has often been the expulsion of an ethnic group, such as the Sudeten
Germans. Economic and military cooperation among these small states was minimal, ensuring that the
defeated powers of Germany and the Soviet Union retained a latent capacity to dominate the region. In
the immediate aftermath of the war, defeat drove cooperation between Germany and the Soviet Union but
ultimately these two powers would compete to dominate Eastern Europe. (Self-Determination and New
States | History of Civilizstion II)

At the end of the war, the Allies occupied Constantinople (Istanbul) and the Ottoman government
collapsed. The Treaty of Sèvres, a plan designed by the Allies to dismember the remaining Ottoman
territories, was signed on August 10, 1920, although it was never ratified by the Sultan.
 A Nation without State: Kurdistan
 Nation-state: A Hope

The dissolution of the Ottoman Empire became a pivotal milestone in the creation of the modern Middle
East, the result of which bore witness to the creation of new conflicts and hostilities in the region.

The end of First World War, the Paris Peace Conference, and the 1920 Treaty of Sèvres marked the
beginning of attempts to define the boundaries of Kurdistan and the first instance of international
promotion of the right of the Kurds to an independent homeland. The treaty and the ideas it embodied
were adopted by Kurdish nationalists as justification for their efforts, both peaceful and violent, to
achieve self-determination. British and Turkish geopolitical maneuvers in and around Kurdistan
prevented the Kurds from obtaining their homeland. The Kurds themselves were unable to unite because
of geographic, political, and cultural divisions. Despite these hindrances, strong Kurdish nationalist
movements developed during this period that would serve as examples for later movements.

During this period, British policy went through three stages with regard to the region and its peoples. The
Kurds were affected by British policy because initially it provided for a Kurdish homeland. A postwar
objective of the Allies was to break up the Ottoman Empire to establish a series of nation-states in the
European mold, including a Kurdistan. The policy changed when Turkey emerged to become a regional
power once again. The rise of Turkey brought confusion to London‟s policy until George Nathaniel
Curzon, the former Viceroy of India, gave it a new direction by brokering a peace with Turkey. Curzon
was influenced by Halford Mackinder‟s geopolitical ideas regarding the Geographical Pivot/Heartland
Theory. Both men recognized the importance of geography and its role in the Great Game. Curzon‟s
experience in India and Mackinder‟s ideas led to a defined British policy of containing threats from the
Soviet Union by surrounding the Heartland through British presence and influence. The Turks, under the
leadership of Mustafa Kemal, were attempting to create a new Turkish identity that included Kurds, as
long as they adopted the new Turkish civic identity, to reassert Turkey‟s position as a regional power.
Some Kurds chose to follow Ankara‟s new direction, while others sought separation from the Turks in
favor of an independent Kurdistan.

Sharif Pasha, a Kurdish expatriate living in Paris, was the sole representative of the Kurdish people at the
Paris Peace Conference, and the negotiators only briefly took him seriously. His spirited effort did little to
influence the negotiations, as the Allies had planned to award a Kurdish state of some sort. However, his
map of Kurdistan became a visual representation of Kurdish territory that captured the imaginations of
nationalists. The Allies had made up their minds to provide for a Kurdish state before negotiations even
began. The British had already experimented with a Kurdish government in Sulaymaniyah prior to the
war‟s conclusion.

Kurdistan under the previous Ottoman regime had served as a guard against Russian expansionism
through the Caucasus. The British renegotiated the terms of the Treaty of Sèvres with the Turks with the
aim of restoring the Turkish buttress against the Heartland, at the expense of an independent Kurdistan
and Armenia. The Treaty of Lausanne established Turkey‟s claims to Anatolia to the borders of the Soviet
Union and Persia. The question of Mosul, then claimed by the British in Iraq, was left open for later
settlement. Possession of Mosul by the Turks would have given Ankara control of most of the formerly
Ottoman Kurdish lands, thus enabling the Turks to deal with the Kurdish nationalists without foreign
interference.

A nationalist sentiment among Kurdish elites had occurred in the late 1800s, and events during and after
World War I had prompted a wider notion of nationalism and territoriality among Kurds. However, not all
Kurds bought into these concepts, as some still clung to a pan-Islamic sentiment. As postwar events
unfolded, more Kurds were brought into the fold. Kurdish elites needed a wider base of support, which
rural sheikhs could provide. Some of these sheikhs sought to lead, themselves, instead of cooperating
with the urban elites. The power shift that occurred in the 1800s from Kurdish princes to the sheikhs held
fast as figures such as Sheikh Said emerged to lead a brief insurgency against the Turks. Similarly, Sheikh
Mahmoud fought against the British and Arabs in Iraq.

 The Paris Peace Conference and the Treaty of Sèvres

After the cataclysm of World War I, the Paris Peace Conference offered the opportunity for a new world.
The optimism and idealism promoted by U.S. President Woodrow Wilson aimed for a lasting peace
reinforced by an international framework and fraternity of states. (MacMillan, 2001, pp. 87-88)

The principle of self-determination from Point Twelve of Wilson‟s Fourteen Points instilled false
confidence in minority populations of the Ottoman Empire that they would soon be able to choose their
own paths as independent nation-states. (O'Shea, 2004, pp. 128-129)

The British found the Ottoman theater of the war much more difficult than they had imagined. At war‟s
end, the British had a hard time maintaining troop concentrations in the Ottoman Empire. The cost of the
war was enormous, and the politicians and population back in Britain sought to hasten troops‟ return
home. The Allies‟ plans to carve up the Ottoman Empire were equally challenging to execute because the
different peoples of the empire were seeking their own futures, rather than leaving outsiders or their old
overlords to decide for them. (Fromkin, 1989, pp. 415-416)

During the war, more attention was paid to the Armenians than to the Kurds. This was likely because the
Armenians were primarily Christian, and thereby more prone to identify with the West and vice versa.
The Kurds were considered complicit in the atrocities committed against the Armenians within the
Ottoman Empire during the early stages of the war. (O'Shea, 2004, pp. 104-105)

Little attention was given to Kurdistan until after the war when the prevailing thought was a realignment
of the Ottoman territories along the European model of nation-states in which Ottoman minorities each
would govern their own people in their own territories. British Foreign Office documents of the time
indicate a certainty of a future Armenian state, but leave out other parties such as the Kurds and the
Assyrians. A sketch of the Draft Treaty of Peace between Turkey and the Allied Governments by Middle-
Eastern Political Section of British Delegation and a map of the "Proposed Settlement of Turkey in Asia"
depict various boundaries for Armenia, but make no mention of Kurdistan. (Paris Peace Conference,
1919)
U.S. President Woodrow Wilson went so far as to order a draft of boundaries for an Armenian state. This
was the atmosphere going into the end of the war and into the peace conference. The horrors of the war
pushed idealism to its extreme in the minds of some negotiators and some heads of states, while the
reality on the ground was starkly different from their grand visions of a new world. Other statesmen,
particularly Lloyd-George and Clemenceau, had imperial interests in mind rather than the international
peace and reconciliation that Wilson professed. (MacMillan, 2001)

After the surrender of the Ottoman Empire and the close of World War I, plans for the lands, resources,
and people under former Ottoman jurisdiction were negotiated. While the U.K. and France were drawing
their lines on the map of the Middle East, the Americans, whom they invited to take up mandates in
Armenia and Kurdistan, refused to become involved on the ground. U.S. foreign policy appeared hesitant
because policymakers feared the U.S. would become entangled in a colonial-style scheme that ran counter
to U.S. ideals and taxpayer wishes. According to Tejirian, “the internationalism of the 1910s, which
followed the first acquisitions of the „American empire‟ after the Spanish-American War and led to U.S.
entry into World War I, was followed by the isolationism of the 1920s, emphasized most dramatically by
U.S. refusal to join the League of Nations.” Lack of international sponsorship was a problem that would
plague the Kurds. (MacMillan, 2001)

The Foreign Office‟s Political Intelligence Department presented British negotiators with a thorough
study of the Ottoman Empire‟s lands and peoples before they attended negotiations in Paris. This
document placed heavy emphasis on Armenia and commitments to the French and Arabs. The situation of
Kurdistan was addressed with the statement, "We are thus committed to the partition of Kurdistan into
three sections, in the two largest of which certain rights are secured to ourselves, the French, and the
Arabs, but none to the Kurds." (Dockrill, 1991)

The study noted the strategic value of Kurdistan thus:

The Power paramount in this country will command the strategic approaches to Mesopotamia and
control the water supply of the eastern affluent of the Tigris, on which the irrigation of Mesopotamia
largely depends. It is therefore essential that the paramount Power in Kurdistan and Mesopotamia should
be the same; in other words, that Great Britain should have an exclusive position in Kurdistan as
opposed to any other outside power. At the same time, the arguments against annexation apply even more
strongly to Kurdistan than to Mesopotamia. It is desirable that the county (sic) should form an
independent confederation of tribes and towns, and that His Majesty's Government should assume
functions intermediate between the administrative assistance, amounting to direct responsibility for the
conduct of government, which they intend to undertake in Mesopotamia, and the mere control of external
relations, to which they propose to limit themselves in the case of the independent rulers of the Arabian
Peninsula. In the hills British control should be exerted with the least direct intervention possible. In the
lowlands bordering on Mesopotamia, where there are important oil-fields and other natural resources, it
may have to approximate to the Mesopotamian pattern. (Dockrill, 1991)

The study further recommended that the Kurdish region in the upper valley of the Greater Zab River be
formed into an autonomous enclave, “under the Government of the Nestorian Prince-Patriarch, with a
constitution modeled on that of the Lebanon -- the necessary outside assistance to be given by Great
Britain." Independence, with British administrative assistance, would be subject to no limitations of
period or function in this situation. The study notes of Kurdistan, "It would be almost equally safe to rely
here too upon the choice of the inhabitants, though it might also be well to point out that the country is
bound up with Mesopotamia geographically and economically, and could not lead a satisfactory existence
if dissociated from it." The office argued for southern Kurdistan‟s attachment to Mesopotamia for
economic convenience, since Kurdistan is landlocked. (Dockrill, 1991)

A memorandum issued by the British Delegation in Paris on British Policy in the Middle East stated, "It is
impossible to include all Kurdish tribes and settlements in a Kurdish State without violating the integrity
of Persia; nor would the Kurds, if united, be capable of governing themselves." The delegation further
argued that if Kurdistan was to be independent it would be bound to Mesopotamia for markets and would
be dependent, as would Mesopotamia to Kurdistan for water; therefore, the delegation recommended that
the mandate be extended from Mesopotamia to Southern Kurdistan. They attached a caveat to this
recommendation, bearing in mind British experiences in India‟s Northwest Frontier and Afghanistan, by
emphasizing that any power involved should intervene with "mountain tribes" as little as possible.
(Dockrill, 1991)

The peace negotiations dealt with territorial divisions, but many of the proposed states or protectorates
had never been clearly defined by boundaries prior to the conference. For centuries, cartographers agreed
on Kurdistan‟s existence, but its boundaries had never been clearly defined. The British were the primary
drivers behind determining where the potential country would be located. In one of the Foreign Office‟s
early descriptions, Kurdistan was defined “as the territory south of the Bohtan River, and east of the
Tigris and the Jebel Hamim, which has hitherto belonged to Turkey, and is bounded on the east by the
Persian frontier.” (Dockrill, 1991)

The Kurdish representative at the Paris Peace Conference was General Muhammad Sharif Pasha. After
the Young Turk Revolution deposed Sultan Abdul Hamid II and sentenced Sharif Pasha to death, he fled
the Ottoman Empire. Sharif Pasha had offered his services to the British at the beginning of the war, but
his offer had been refused because the British did not anticipate their being engaged with operations in
Kurdistan. He spent the war years in Monte Carlo waiting for another opportunity. Despite his
disappointment with the British, Sharif Pasha reestablished his contact with the British near the end of the
war. (Jwaideh, 2006)

In 1918, he began communicating with Sir Percy Cox, the head of British forces in Mesopotamia, to
discuss establishing British protection over an autonomous Kurdistan. He argued for similar arrangements
in Mesopotamia and elsewhere, describing something akin to the mandate system. He also argued for a
British sponsored committee aimed at reconciling relations between the Kurds and the Armenians.
Kurdish nationalist organizations nominated Sharif Pasha as their representative at the Paris Peace
Conference because of his strategic views and high level contacts within the British government.
(Jwaideh, 2006)

At Paris, Sharif Pasha carefully laid out Kurdish claims to territory and constructed an argument for
Kurdish independence. His claims were based on areas where Kurds constituted the dominant population.
He included the Persian Empire‟s Kurdish territories in addition to Ottoman lands. His inclusion of the
Persian Kurdish lands was merely to make a point that the Kurds were a large nation spanning a large
area, thereby worthy of a homeland free from the outside interference that had often plagued Kurdistan.
(O'Shea, 2004)
Delegates representing the Kurds, the Armenians, and the Assyrians presented claims to territory and
independence. Bughos Nubar, the chief Armenian delegate, had confided to Sir Louis Mallet of the
British Delegation fears that the Allies were "abandoning Armenia to her fate." He worried about French
ambition in Armenia, and sought British and US recognition for Armenian independence. (Dockrill,
1991)

Sharif Pasha and Bughos Nubar agreed to support each other‟s bid for independence even if there were
disagreements as to the particulars of territory. The two presented overlapping claims and criticized each
other‟s demands, but the scheme worked. The negotiators were convinced that both the Kurds and the
Armenians deserved homelands in the new Middle East, and granted provisions for statehood and self-
determination in the resulting Treaty of Sèvres.

Sharif Pasha grew frustrated with the Allies over his sidelining in negotiations and with the Kurdish
League over his agreement with the Armenians, and eventually resigned his post. Following his
marginalization, Sharif produced a pamphlet outlining the justification for Kurdistan‟s territories.
(O'Shea, 2004)

Some groups formerly under Ottoman dominion desired reclamation of lands they perceived as their own.
Greek irredentism gained the support of the British, thus enabling them to land Greek forces at Izmir.
However, the Greeks became too covetous toward the Turks, and found themselves on the retreat before
Turkish retaliation near the plateau of Ankara. The Turks had found a new nationalist leader, and the fall
of the Ottoman Empire and its Sultanate was certain. (Fromkin, 1989)

Britain‟s Prime Minister and chief diplomat, David Lloyd-George, summarizes and laments the
difficulties in dealing with the post-world war Ottoman Empire:

In some respects the settlement of the Turkish Empire presented greater difficulties than that of any other
enemy country. There was a greater variety of races and religions to be dealt with. They were more
hopelessly intermingled without any trace or hope of merger. There were historical complications which
had never been unraveled. There were the jealousies of Powers, each of them with real or imaginary
interests—historical, religious, financial or territorial—in some corner of this dilapidated Empire. There
was a wilderness of decay and ruin, the result of centuries of misrule prolonged to the last hours of
Turkish dominion, which had to be dealt with. There were whole provinces devastated and depopulated
by butchery inspired, decreed and directed by the State. Records and ruins prove that during centuries of
history there once existed in a vast area of this decadent Empire the most flourishing civilizations in the
world. There was hardly one corner of it which would not have to be reconstructed and rebuilt from the
foundation upwards to recall a faint memory of its pristine opulence and splendour. (Paris Peace
Conference, 1919)

The situation was indeed a difficult one to sort out, and any agreement was likely to anger the Turks. The
idea of Kurdistan seems to be an afterthought with Lloyd George as he states, “Kurdistan was accorded
local autonomy, with the right to secede in one year from Turkey.” This is his only mention of Kurdistan
throughout his memoirs of the Paris Peace Conference.

The British viewed an independent or autonomous Kurdistan as a means of establishing a buffer, along
with an independent Armenia, against Russia and any renewed territorial ambitions under the new
leadership there. However, they did not wish to over-commit British involvement with the Kurds. The
Foreign Office Oriental Secretary, Andrew Ryan, made clear the British policy of reserve toward Kurds
and all minority groups to Reshid Pasha, the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Meetings on the Turkish settlement and the Ottoman minorities progressed with much favor given to the
Armenians. French diplomat Philippe Berthelot communicated to Curzon that the French had great
concern for the Armenians. Both Berthelot and members of the Political Section of the British Peace
Delegation believed Armenian population numbers were underestimated noting, "the Armenian is more
prolific than the Turk, or Kurd." (Dockrill, 1991)

This statement reveals a strong bias by Britain and France for the Armenian population.

The British Peace Delegation‟s Political Section produced a memorandum on December 18 detailing
provisions for an autonomous Kurdistan as part of the Turkish settlement. This was what the British were
prepared to discuss with the French, and in turn the Ottomans:

It is considered that there should be south of the above-mentioned Armenian zone an autonomous
Kurdish zone, in which Turkish sovereignty should obviously cease to run. The eastern boundary of this
zone should be the Turko-Persian frontier; the western boundary would run approximately south-west of
Mush to Diarbekir, but would depend on the northern and eastern frontiers of the French mandatory zone
(see below); details would have to be drawn by an expert commission. The southern boundary and size of
the zone must depend on a decision regarding the northern frontier of Mesopotamia, which, in turn, must
depend on British security and administrative convenience. It is understood that this question has recently
been discussed by the Eastern Committee, and, as far as we are aware, the three possible frontiers
discussed are shown on the annexed map. It will be seen that the size of the autonomous Kurdish State
must depend on the final choice among these frontiers, but after the experience of this war the safety of
the Nestorian colony (to whom the Allies are under some obligation), on the upper waters of the Greater
Zab, if included in an autonomous Kurdish area, would be precarious. Some preference is therefore felt
on this score for the most northerly frontier. (Dockrill, 1991)

The Anglo-French Conference on Turkey took place days later in four meetings across December 22 and
23, but Kurdistan was discussed only in the third meeting. In that meeting, Lord Curzon reviewed a note
by M. Berthelot on Kurdistan, which “proposed that part of Kurdistan should fall within the British
Mesopotamian mandate, but that the rest might be formed into a federation of Kurdish tribes under some
form of loose Anglo-French control, but with the maintenance in theory of Turkish sovereignty."
(Dockrill, 1991)

Curzon doubted the Sultan's control in Kurdistan even in name only, and considered the division of
Kurdistan into spheres of influence or control between Britain and France to be a bad idea. He suggested
to Berthelot that their governments pursue this outline in coming to a final decision regarding Kurdistan:

1. No mandate, whether English or French, or Anglo-French, was possible or desirable for

Kurdistan as a whole, except perhaps for the more settled areas in Southern Kurdistan.
2. Turkish rule, for obvious reasons which past experience made clear, should not continue in
Kurdistan in even a nominal form.
3. The Kurds were quite capable of making (and according to his latest information were disposed
to make) a working arrangement with the Assyrians on one side and the Armenians on the other.
The Kurdistan question could not therefore be considered apart from the formation of the
Armenian State on which the French and British were agreed.
4. Lord Curzon's own idea was to allow the Kurds to decide whether they would form a single State
ratified and was annulled in the course of the “Turkish War of Independence”, and the parties signed and
ratified the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923 and 1924. (Treaty of Sèvres - Wikipedia, 1920)

The Treaty of Lausanne was a peace treaty negotiated during the Lausanne Conference of 1922–23 and
signed in the Palais de Rumine, Lausanne, Switzerland, on 24 July 1923. It officially settled the conflict
that had originally existed between the Ottoman Empire and the Allied French Republic, British
Empire, Kingdom of Italy, Empire of Japan, Kingdom of Greece, and the Kingdom of Romania since the
onset of World War I. The original text of the treaty is in French. It was the result of a second attempt at
peace after the failed Treaty of Sèvres. It ended the conflict and defined the borders of the modern
Turkish Republic. In the treaty, Turkey gave up all claims to the remainder of the Ottoman Empire and in
return the Allies recognized Turkish sovereignty within its new borders. (Treaty of Lausanne - Wikipedia,
1923)

Conclusion:
The Treaty of Lausanne, on one side, which entitled some states to design and secure their own borders;
on the other side, it blew out all the hopes of Kurdish people for their nation-state for an unanticipated
period. And the creation of new nation-state had been just a mirage for them.

Although, it wouldn‟t be wrong to say that the world‟s most privileged region by nature has become the
curse of devil. And human greed has always an eye on it which never wants to see it as an independent
state ever.
 APPENDIX
SECTION III of Treaty of Sèvres which pertained to Kurdistan and it gave the hope to Kurds at first time
in the history to establish their own nation-state. The articles under this section were as follows:

ARTICLE 62

A Commission sitting at Constantinople and composed of three members appointed by the British, French
and Italian Governments respectively shall draft within six months from the coming into force of the
present Treaty a scheme of local autonomy for the predominantly Kurdish areas lying east of the
Euphrates, south of the southern boundary of Armenia as it may be hereafter determined, and north of the
frontier of Turkey with Syria and Mesopotamia, as defined in Article 27, II (2) and (3). If unanimity
cannot be secured on any question, it will be referred by the members of the Commission to their
respective Governments. The scheme shall contain full safeguards for the protection of the Assyro-
Chaldeans and other racial or religious minorities within these areas, and with this object a Commission
composed of British, French, Italian, Persian and Kurdish representatives shall visit the spot to examine
and decide what rectifications, if any, should be made in the Turkish frontier where, under the provisions
of the present Treaty, that frontier coincides with that of Persia.

ARTICLE 63

The Turkish Government hereby agrees to accept and execute the decisions of both the Commissions
mentioned in Article 62 within three months from their communication to the said Government.

ARTICLE 64

If within one year from the coming into force of the present Treaty the Kurdish peoples within the areas
defined in Article 62 shall address themselves to the Council of the League of Nations in such a manner
as to show that a majority of the population of these areas desires independence from Turkey, and if the
Council then considers that these peoples are capable of such independence and recommends that it
should be granted to them, Turkey hereby agrees to execute such a recommendation, and to renounce all
rights and title over these areas.

The detailed provisions for such renunciation will form the subject of a separate agreement between the
Principal Allied Powers and Turkey.

If and when such renunciation takes place, no objection will be raised by the Principal Allied Powers to
the voluntary adhesion to such an independent Kurdish State of the Kurds inhabiting that part of
Kurdistan which has hitherto been included in the Mosul vilayet.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_S%C3%A8vres

Treaty of Lausanne - Wikipedia. (1923). Retrieved from Wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Lausanne

Migration and Inclusive Societies. (2012). Retrieved from United Nations Educational, Scientific and
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Dockrill, M. (1991).

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