Bardarash (Arabic: بردرش, Kurdish: بەردەڕەش, romanizedBerdereş)[2][3] or ʿAshā'ir al-Sabaʿ (Arabic: عشائر السبع)[4] is a town and subdistrict in Nineveh Governorate, Iraq. It is regarded as part of Akre District in the Nineveh Governorate by the Iraqi government, however, it is de facto controlled by the Kurdistan Regional Government, as part of the Bardarash district of the Dohuk Governorate.[5]

Bardarash
Town
Bardarash is located in Iraq
Bardarash
Bardarash
Location in Iraq
Bardarash is located in Iraqi Kurdistan
Bardarash
Bardarash
Bardarash (Iraqi Kurdistan)
Coordinates: 36°30′12.2″N 43°35′14″E / 36.503389°N 43.58722°E / 36.503389; 43.58722
Country Iraq
Region Kurdistan Region (de facto)
GovernorateNineveh Governorate (de jure)
Dohuk Governorate (de facto)
DistrictAkre District (de jure)
Bardarash (de facto)
Sub-districtBardarash
Population
 (2014)[1]
 • Urban
25,263
 • Rural
5,068

Bardarash is mostly inhabited by Sunni Muslims.[5]

Etymology

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The Kurdish name of the town is derived from "ber" ("stone" in Kurdish) and "reş" ("black" in Kurdish), and thus translates to "black stone",[6] whereas the Arabic name ʿAshā'ir al-Sabaʿ translates to "seven clans" in reference to the seven clans that reside at Bardarash: the Zangana, Darbazi, Bot, Razgary, Gezh, Chopani, and the Řožbayānī.[7]

History

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In the aftermath of the First World War, Ismāʿīl Agha and Ḥājjī Agha were noted as the tribal leaders of the ʿAshā'ir al-Sabaʿ by British intelligence at the onset of the British administration of Iraq.[8] Ismāʿīl Agha was the head of the Bizaini section of ʿAshā'ir al-Sabaʿ and was known to be pro-British.[4] He suffered considerably due to the proximity of the Assyrian refugee camp at Mindan in 1920 and his rivalry with Ḥājjī ʿAbdallāh ibn Raḥmān of Jujjar in the Aqra district was observed in a British intelligence report in 1923.[4]

In 1997, 79 villages were recorded as part of the Bardarash subdistrict with a total population of 47,564 people.[9] A camp was established at Bardarash for Iraqis displaced by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and was later semi-decommissioned in December 2017.[10][11] The camp was reopened for refugees in October 2019,[11] and over 7000 Kurds from northern Syria who had fled the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria arrived within a week.[12] The camp's population grew to an estimated 11,000 refugees by November, of whom roughly 75% were women and children,[10] and reached 14,031 refugees by July 2020.[11] By June 2021, 13,986 refugees had left after having obtained residency permits in the Kurdistan Region whilst 1488 had returned to Syria, leaving 3541 at the camp.[13]

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References

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  1. ^ Ali Sindi; Ramanathan Balakrishnan; Gerard Waite (July 2018). "Kurdistan Region of Iraq: Demographic Survey" (PDF). ReliefWeb. International Organization for Migration. Retrieved 5 September 2021.
  2. ^ "سەرۆكی پێشووی یانەی وەرزشیی بەردەڕەش دەدرێتە دادگا". Rudaw Media Network (in Kurdish). Retrieved 21 December 2019.
  3. ^ "Penaberên nû gehiştine Kampa Berdereş behsa rewşên xwe dikin". Rebaz News (in Kurdish). Retrieved 21 December 2019.
  4. ^ a b c Zaken (2007), p. 160.
  5. ^ a b Findahl (2019), p. 67.
  6. ^ Chyet (2003), pp. 36, 509.
  7. ^ Findahl (2019), pp. 66–67.
  8. ^ Zaken (2007), p. 63.
  9. ^ Stansfield (2003), p. 187.
  10. ^ a b Elizabeth Hagedorn (20 November 2019). "Inside the Bardarash refugee camp, Syria's Kurds await their fate". Middle East Eye. Retrieved 4 September 2021.
  11. ^ a b c "COVID-19 Impact Assessment: Bardarash refugee camp - Iraq (July 2020)". ReliefWeb. 20 October 2020. Retrieved 4 September 2021.
  12. ^ Alix Culbertson (22 October 2019). "Syrian refugees being charged hundreds of dollars each to cross border into Iraq". Sky News. Retrieved 4 September 2021.
  13. ^ Alicia Medina (20 June 2021). "Bardarash camp in Iraqi Kurdistan: Those who remain behind". Syria Direct. Retrieved 28 October 2021.

Bibliography

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  • Chyet, Michael L. (2003). Kurdish–English Dictionary. Yale University Press.
  • Findahl, Jon (2019). "Collecting contemporary knowledge on Gorani spoken east of Mosul". In I. M. Nick (ed.). Forensic Linguistics: Asylum-seekers, Refugees and Immigrants. Vernon Press. pp. 57–74.
  • Stansfield, Gareth R. V. (2003). Iraqi Kurdistan: Political Development and Emergent Democracy. Routledge.
  • Zaken, Mordechai (2007). Jewish Subjects and Their Tribal Chieftains in Kurdistan: A Study in Survival. Brill.