Dibis District | second-level administrative division

 district, second-level administrative division, draw only border

Dibis District was a district in northwestern Kirkuk Governorate, northern Iraq. Its administrative center was the town of Dibis. The former Dibis district was split in two. The part of the former district northwest of the Little Zab River was added to Erbil province, while the part south-east of the Little Zab River was added to Kirkuk province.

Dibis Center has constantly been part of Kirkuk governorate; however, Sargaran has shuttled back and forth between Kirkuk and Erbil since 1976.

Republican Decree no. 33 of 1976 transferred what is now Sargaran subdistrict from Erbil governorate to Dibis in preparation for upgrading Dibis, which was then a subdistrict within Kirkuk district, to a district later that year under Republican Decree no. 72 of 1976. Republican Decree no. 434 of 1989, which followed the widespread destruction of villages and expulsion of populations from Dibis district during the Anfal, downgraded it to a subdistrict and returned current day Sargaran to Erbil. Republican Decree no. 235 of 1996 transferred this same oil-rich area of Sargaran from the now autonomous Kurdish Zone back to central government controlled Dibis. Republican Decree no. 245 of 2000 restored Dibis’ district status and upgraded Sargaran to a subdistrict, but with the name of Al-Quds (“Jerusalem”), which local officials indicated to UNAMI was aimed at giving it an Arab identity.

In 1975, Dibis was included in RCCD no. 369 of 1975 that expropriated 135,022 donum around Kirkuk governorate. RCCD no. 949 of 1979 expropriated 123,391 donum in Dibis and Altun Kupri and registered the land in the name of the Ministry of Finance. In 1978, RCCD no. 189 expropriated further lands in Sargaran subdistrict. Local interlocutors stressed to UNAMI the importance of these decrees to the future settlement of Arab farmers in the district. Historical accounts of the Anfal provided to UNAMI indicate that Dibis would have been part of the fourth Anfal operation in May 1988. In Dibis, following the Anfal, the District Council stated to UNAMI that all of Dibis Center’s forty-two villages were destroyed and their populations expelled. Subsequently, they indicated that no Kurds were able to live in the area until 2003. Likewise, in Sargaran, officials stated to UNAMI that all the villages in the subdistrict were destroyed and their populations deported. The drop in the district’s population due to the destruction and deportations may have been part of why Dibis was downgraded to a subdistrict in 1989.

After the establishment of the Kurdish Autonomous Zone in 1991, Dibis underwent the settlement of substantial numbers of Arab farmers. Notes of a 1994 Meeting of the Tri-Partite Committee for Arabization identified Altun Kupri, Dibis, and Zab as priority areas for settling Arab tribes to create a cordon of security adjacent to the newly established Kurdish Autonomy Zone. The resulting population influx may have helped Dibis to regain district status in 2000. Altun Kupri was continuously part of Kirkuk until Republican Decree no. 434 of 1989 transferred it from Dibis district to Erbil governorate. Kupri was subsequently transferred back to Dibis, although exactly when is unclear.

Local interlocutors reported to UNAMI that thirty-one of the thirty-five subdistrict’s villages had been destroyed for “political reasons” by 2003, most of them during the Anfal. Due to its strategic location on the highway connecting Kirkuk and Erbil cities, as well as its front-line status, Kupri was targeted for the settlement of Arab tribes during the 1990s.
The Iraqi Army, the Federal Police and the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) regained a control on the 16th of October, 2017.