The Day After Mosul: Lessons from Kirkuk

While the military campaign to expel ISIS from the Iraqi city of Mosul proceeds apace, officials in the country and abroad are concerned with the future of the city and its surroundings once the terrorist group is eliminated. To discuss the “day after“ challenges once the battle for Mosul is over, the Institute hosted Gov. Najmaldin Karim, the governor of Iraq’s Kirkuk province, in a policy forum on Nov. 14, 2016. The conversation was moderated by Lafer Fellow Michael Knights, who had recently returned from a two-week trip to Iraq. Kirkuk -- often described as a flashpoint for future Arab-Kurdish tensions -- has weathered the Islamic State storm relatively well, becoming a safe haven for many of the Arabs who have fled the terrorist onslaught since 2014. Najmaldin Karim was elected governor of Kirkuk province in 2011 after years of service as a pioneering Kurdish activist, Peshmerga medic, and opposition leader during the Saddam Hussein era. Under his tenure, the province has drastically