Özet:
This thesis is focused on an overview of Northern Iraq relations with Turkey,
especially in terms of its geopolitical potentials, on those fields like geographical,
political and economic challenges. It portrays and examines the main essence of
relations between Turkey and Northern Iraq. It tries to answer the questions of how
economic relations between Turkey and Northern Iraq affect each country. It
explores the political, economic and geographical aspects which foster the relations
between Turkey and Northern Iraq. It equally shows the energy aspect as the key
instrument in building relations between Turkey and Northern Iraq. Northern Iraqi
government begins to strengthen the relationship with all neighbours. It is due to the
Northern Iraq’s geographical position, especially its importance for tourists, so, a lot
of people are interested in Northern Iraq, number of businessmen from the neighbour
countries especially from Turkey come to Ibrahim Khalil custom. Northern Iraqi
region is rich in terms of natural sources such as oil, gas and many minerals, so, this
leads for having good relations between Turkey and Northern Iraq. ISIS fighting in
Northern Iraq interrupts relations between Erbil and Baghdad and causes economic
downfall in the region, but it has an impact on Turkey and Northern Iraq relations in
exporting oil and in the near future exporting natural gas from Northern Iraq to
Turkey and to the other countries. This thesis consists of four main sections. The first
chapter, as an introductory chapter, is focused on main research question, subquestions
and characteristics and research technique of the paper. Second chapter
deals with the impact of geography on the relations between Turkey and Northern
Iraq. The third chapter informs about political position of the Northern Iraq and its
impacts on the relations with Turkey and the referendum in North of Iraq. In the
fourth chapter, energy reserves in the Northern Iraq and its impacts on the relations
with Turkey will be analysed. In the conclusion, various aspects of the Turkey-
Northern Iraq relations are revealed.
