Mosul Problem

“Many valuable works in the field of Kurdish studies escape the attention of contemporary researchers because they are found in obscure publications, written in foreign languages, or are ignored because they were written in ancient times. This inattention cannot be tolerated any more when one realizes the relative scarcity of creative works on the Kurds. These works need to be revealed and republished. This first attempt of its kind should serve as a prime example of why such original research and documentation should not be overlooked. Vladimir Feodorovich Minorsky (1877-1966), one of the founders of the field of Kurdish studies, writes here a detailed story of the cession of Central Kurdistan to the newborn state of Iraq. The work provides a wealth of documents of various origins and valuable statistics and maps rarely seen in later sources and virtually unknown to most contemporary researchers.”

Mehrdad R. Izady

Kurdish researcher Mehrdad R. Izady describes the book of Vladimir F. Minorsky, who was well aware of the Mosul issue and who wrote many objective studies dealing with the countries and problems of the Near and Middle East, published in America in 1926, as "a collection of old scientific works and primary sources in the archives of the Kurdish Library." He republished it by adding explanations within the scope of "the project of republishing the translations". At a time when the Mosul issue remains "current" and Iraqi Kurdistan is at a new turning point, the data presented by Minorsky offers the opportunity to look at the problem objectively and closely.