Kirkuk
Kirkuk is located in Northeast of Iraq, about 250 kilometers northeast of the capital Baghdad, near
the foot of Zaqaros Mountains. The city built on the Khasa River, on an area with archeological
remains of over 5000 years old.
The present city of Kirkuk stand on the site of the
ancient city called Arrapha, which existed in the 5th
Millennium BC. The city reached great prominence
in the l0th and 11th centuries under the Assyrian's
rule when it was known as (Arrapha).
The oldest
part of the city is clustered around a citadel built on
an ancient tell or mount containing the remains of a
settlement dating back to 3000 B.C.
Historically an ethnically mixed city populated by Kurds Arabs, Turkomen and Assyrians, along
to other minorities like Armenians and Kurdish Kakaes. Kirkuk is also the center of the Iraqi
petroleum industry and thus strategically and economically important to the Iraqi state. The
area around Kirkuk and south to Khanaqin is the preserve of the Faili Kurds, who, unlike the
majority of Kurds, are Shia.
Kirkuk is the center of Iraq's oil industry and it is connected by pipelines to ports on the
Mediterranean Sea. Kirkuk has over 10 billion barrels of remaining proven oil reserves. After
about seven decades of operation, Kirkuk still produces up to one million barrels a day, almost
half of Iraqi exports. Kirkuk is a market for the region's produce, including cereals, olives, fruits,
and cotton. There is a small textile industry. Kirkuk is located in northern Iraq, about 250
kilometers north of the capital Baghdad, near the foot of the Zagros Mountains.
