Kirkuk Farmer Faces 30th Court Appearance Amid Land Rights Dispute

ERBIL (Kurdistan24) - Mohammed Amin, a representative of Kurdish farmers in Kirkuk's Sargaran sub-district, returned to court on Sunday for what were described as his 29th and 30th hearings, more than 18 months after a confrontation with Iraqi soldiers on farmland in Shanakha village brought national attention to the pressures facing Kurdish agricultural communities.

Amin's case has developed into a closely watched test of farmers' ability to defend their land and pursue complaints through the courts in the Kurdistani territories outside KRG administrative control, where ownership disputes remain entangled with the legacy of Ba'ath-era demographic policies.

According to information provided to Kurdistan24, Amin filed two complaints against a military operations commander and a soldier identified as Karrar following the Feb. 17, 2025 incident. Those complaints have been suspended.

The commander and soldier, meanwhile, filed two cases against Amin. The Kurdish farmer has been summoned 28 times during the proceedings, while the opposing parties have not appeared before the court, according to the supplied reporting, resulting in repeated postponements.

Sunday's sessions therefore return attention not only to the specific allegations surrounding Amin, but to a broader question repeatedly raised by Kurdish farming communities: whether existing legal institutions can provide timely and equal protection for landowners whose claims are rooted in decades-old dispossession and contested administrative decisions.

A confrontation captured on camera

The case began while Amin was working his agricultural land with a tractor in Shanakha on Feb. 17, 2025.

During an intervention by an Iraqi army unit, video recorded by a Kurdistan24 news team showed a soldier pulling Amin by the cloth around his neck as the farmer remained on his tractor. Amin said he was insulted during the encounter.

The footage circulated widely and became central to Amin's account of the incident. He has continued to rely on the recording as evidence while rejecting pressure that he says has been placed on him to withdraw his complaint.

The confrontation resonated because it came amid a series of disputes involving Kurdish farmers seeking access to agricultural land around Kirkuk and neighboring areas.

For many of those families, the issue extends far beyond individual farming seasons.

Large areas in Kirkuk, Khurmatu, Khanaqin and other Kurdistani territories outside KRG administrative control were subjected to land confiscation and demographic policies under Iraq's former Ba'ath government.

Agricultural properties belonging to Kurdish and Turkmen communities were seized in various areas, while contracts were issued to Arab families relocated under state-sponsored Arabization programs.

The collapse of the former government in 2003 did not automatically resolve those competing claims. Farmers, settlers, courts and government institutions continue to confront overlapping documentation and unresolved questions over the legal effect of earlier decisions.

Article 140 of Iraq's 2005 Constitution established a process intended to address the consequences of demographic alteration in these territories through normalization, a census and a referendum. Its implementation, however, has remained incomplete.

The result is that questions originating decades ago continue to shape whether farmers can cultivate fields today.

Courtrooms become another front in land disputes

Amin's repeated appearances are not an isolated example.

In July, 20 Kurdish farmers from Tapa Sawz village in Khurmatu appeared before a local court following lawsuits filed by Arab settlers claiming ownership of agricultural land and alleging assaults during confrontations over access to the fields.

The Kurdish farmers disputed those ownership claims, which involve land historically affected by Ba'ath-era agricultural contracts.

Previous disputes in Tapa Sawz have included arrest warrants and attempts to prevent Kurdish farmers from cultivating approximately 1,800 dunams of farmland, according to Kurdistan24 reporting. Farmers there say the land belongs to their families and have argued that older contracts issued to relocated Arab settlers should no longer determine ownership.

Ahmed Jumaa, a representative of Tapa Sawz farmers, previously told Kurdistan24 that his community was displaced in 1987 and that its villages were destroyed. He said Arab settlers later received contracts covering the agricultural land.

The farmers have also cited correspondence from Iraq's Agriculture Ministry stating that the area falls within the Article 140 process and that contracts should not be renewed pending a parliamentary resolution, a previous Kurdistan24 report showed.

A separate dispute emerged this month in Topzawa, where farmers protested against a proposed Kirkuk urban master plan that they said could affect thousands of dunams of agricultural land.

Residents said the plan could convert disputed farmland into residential plots before outstanding ownership claims are settled.

They called for implementation of Law No. 3 of 2025, which they say repealed former Ba'ath government decisions governing confiscated agricultural properties and provides a legal path toward returning land to original owners. They have also demanded the executive regulations necessary to put that legislation into effect.

Taken together, the cases demonstrate how land rights in Kirkuk have increasingly moved from farms and administrative offices into courtrooms.

For Kurdish farmers, the concern is both economic and historical. Agricultural land provides livelihoods, but many families also regard continued cultivation as evidence of their connection to villages from which earlier governments attempted to displace them.

That distinction makes disputes over tractors, harvesting or individual plots politically sensitive. What appears before a court as a conflict over a contract or a confrontation in a field can carry a much longer history of displacement, demographic engineering and unresolved restitution.

Kurdish officials have repeatedly called for those disputes to be addressed through constitutional and legal mechanisms. Farmers, meanwhile, have sought implementation of legislation intended to reverse earlier confiscations rather than leaving individual families to repeatedly defend their claims through separate lawsuits.

Amin's case illustrates the frustration produced when that process becomes prolonged.

His own complaints concerning the conduct of military personnel remain suspended, according to the primary reporting, while cases brought against him have required dozens of court appearances.

Amin has maintained that the Kurdistan24 footage supports his account and has refused to abandon his pursuit of the complaints despite what he describes as continuing pressure.

Sunday's hearings will ultimately concern the cases before the Kirkuk court and the evidence available to the judge. Their broader significance, however, derives from the environment in which they are taking place.

Across the Kurdistani territories outside KRG administrative control, Kurdish farmers continue to seek practical enforcement of land rights that they say have remained unsettled for decades.

For Amin, his latest return to court is another stage in that process. For other farmers watching from Kirkuk, Khurmatu and surrounding districts, the question is whether the legal system can finally provide durable answers to disputes that have outlasted governments, generations and repeated attempts at legislative resolution.