Chapter 22 Nationality and Sect in Ottoman and Post-Ottoman Iraq
In: Ottoman War and PeaceSearch for other papers by Dina Rizk Khoury in
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Abstract
Ottoman and Iraqi Nationality laws were not based on the liberal secular concept of national individual rights. The Lausanne Treaty and the series of nationality laws that emerged in its aftermath, based as they were on the Ottoman Nationality Law, assumed that religion and nationality were intertwined and singled out non-Muslims for protection. This chapter argues that while the language of the Iraqi Nationality Law did not designate the Shi’is of Iraq as a separate religious group, conflicts between Iraqi/British and Iranian officials and between these officials and local populations over jurisdictional sovereignty during implementation led to the deployment by all parties of the rhetoric of minority/majority and of sect.