SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq — The July 17 shooting in Erbil’s Huqqabaz restaurant, in which Turkish diplomat Osman Kose and two Kurdish citizens were killed, will haunt crisis-hit Iraqi Kurdistan for the coming years, despite the quick arrest of the alleged perpetrators.
Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, previously was described as the most stable part of Iraq, and accordingly becoming a hub for foreign diplomats as well as investors. This gun attack was the first major incident in Erbil since the 2005 suicide bombings, in which at least 60 Kurds were killed and 150 others were wounded. Now the city’s stability is again in question.
