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Pope Francis will visit Erbil in the autonomous region of Kurdistan next Sunday during his historic visit to Iraq
By Mélinée Le Priol (special envoy to Erbil) | Iraq
They call it "the Dubai of Kurdistan".
The city's 1.5 million inhabitants are mainly Sunni Kurds. But there are also Turkmens, Christians and Yazidis.
Erbil is distinctive by its gleaming skyscrapers, vast air-conditioned shopping malls and ambitious unfinished construction site.
And Pope Francis will go there next Sunday, the last full day of his March 5-8 visit to Iraq.
He will preside at an afternoon Mass in a soccer stadium that holds 30,000 spectators. But attendance for the liturgy will be limited to only 10,000 worshipers due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The stadium is named after Franso Hariri, an Assyrian Christian who was governor of Erbil and a major figure of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (PDK).
The sports venue is just a short distance from the citadel, the historic center around which Erbil unfolds in concentric circles.
This citadel is said to have been erected over 6,000 years ago, before ancient Arbele became a prosperous Assyrian city from the 6th century BC.
During the Saddam Hussein regime (1979-2003), Erbil was just a modest provincial city. It has since benefited from the development of a rentier economy, based on external rents related exclusively to oil.
Kurdistan has been an autonomous region since 1991. It controls 40% of Iraq's oil reserves, itself the world's second largest producer.
But a referendum on independence in 2017 led to a harsh confrontation with the federal forces in Baghdad, which regained control of most of the "disputed territories," including the province of Kirkuk, whose oil fields are the richest in the country.
Baghdad also retaliated against Kurdistan's desire for independence by closing Erbil International Airport.
Located just beyond the brand new expressway that encircles the city, the airport reopened six months later.
Pro-Iranian Shia militias launched rockets on the surrounding area on February 15, underscoring the precarious security situation in the region and raising fears that the pope's trip would have to be cancelled.
But such attacks on Erbil remain rare, and the city has gradually gained a reputation as a pole of stability in an Iraq worn down by four decades of war and almost continuous violence.
Already in the 2000s, Christians from Mosul and Baghdad sought refuge in Ainkawa, an old Christian village separated from the city that has since expanded and is being gentrified.
City of refuge after ISIS
Tens of thousands of Christians from the Nineveh Plain took hasty refuge in Anikawa's churches, public gardens and the still-unfinished buildings in the summer of 2014 as ISIS took over their hometowns.
Many still live there today, especially those who refuse to return to Mosul or the surrounding area, where they no longer feel "welcome" and fear confrontation with their Muslim neighbors.
The Erbil metropolitan area is also home to Yazidi from the Sinjar Mountains, even though they are still numerous in the camps for displaced persons in northwestern Kurdistan.
Here in the Kurdish regional capital, preparations for the pope's visit are discreet.
In the midst of the health crisis and the economic slump, most of the Sunni Muslim residents of Erbil -- Christians of Ainkawa are a different story, of course -- don't seem to be particularly interested in the impromptu visit.
But some Kurds see it as a "major step" in the recognition of the legitimacy of their autonomous region.
They are hoping that the pope will publicly back their aspirations for an independent Kurdistan.
At any rate, most expect Francis will at least praise Erbil for its ability to "respect minorities and believe in fraternity".
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