IRBIL
Iraqi Turkmen Front, or ITF, has strongly criticized Iraqi central government's refusal to grant visa to an opposition party leader in Turkey who wanted to visit the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk.
Aydin Maroof, ITF's envoy in Irbil, defined the Maliki government's decision as "a historic mistake" that blocked Devlet Bahceli, chairman of the Nationalist Movement Party, from paying a visit in the oil-rich city during Muslims' holy Ramadan holiday.
"Our holiday joy turned into grief. This will not be forgotten for long years to come. Bahceli would just visit his kinsmen and he would do it for peace," Maroof told the Anadolu Agency correspondent.
Maroof also dismissed the central government's justifying the visa denial on security grounds, saying it showed Maliki's "ethnic and sectarian approach" to Kirkuk.
