RUSSIA AND THE NORTHEAST ASIA NUCLEAR WEAPON FREE ZONE PROSPECTS: THE NORTH KOREA CHALLENGE

Abstract

The article studies the possible prerequisites for the migration crisis, which became relevant in connection with the influx of illegal immigrants from Iraqi Kurdistan to the EU borders in the second half of 2021. Using the example of the Dohuk province, which has become the main source of illegal immigration it can be featured as “cauldron” of refugees and interally displaced persons (IDPs) as a result of the destabilization in Syria and Iraq since 2014. The author uses the “core-periphery” model, where the EU now as a «core of attraction» for illegal migrants from Kurdistan, and the “Belarusian” migration crisis has become an important marker of the refugees turning into non-state actors with their own agenda, using new political opportunities for immigration to EU countries. At the same time, the regional government of Iraqi Kurdistan (KRG) used the refugees in Iraqi Kurdistan to expand its spatial control and forming borders of the autonomy. The displacement of the refugees has become the main alibi for building Iraqi Kurdistan’s own state security system, which could potentially be assumed as creation of an independent state. This sometimes caused discrepancies in the concepts of refugees and IDPs, which, on the one hand, shows the powerful role of refugees in the formation and strengthening of Kurdish ethno-national particularism, but at the same time leaves much space to the actualization of push-factors, mainly economic, affecting the intensification of illegal migration from Iraqi Kurdistan to Europe.