PBS高端访谈:伊拉克政府军与库尔德武装处于对峙状态

 　　The desire of the Kurds along Iraq's northern border to govern themselves is receiving more resistance from Iraq's central government.

　　Iraqi army forces are demanding Kurdish troops withdraw from oil fields and military bases around Kirkuk,

　　a city in the Kurdistan region that voted for independence last month.

　　Kirkuk also has 10% of Iraq's known oil reserves. Washington Post's Loveday Morris is in Baghdad covering this standoff joins me now via Skype.

　　First of all the significance of this. Why is it so important?

　　Well... There's been a longtime conflict between Baghdad and Kurdistan over these disputed territories.

　　Most significant of which is Kirkuk because of the oil reserves.

　　But the referendum last month has really sharpened these disputes because you have Baghdad opposing independence

　　That means the Baghdad it left want to see these areas

　　because it feels like they have to restate its territorial¹ claims these areas.

　　So that's why we're seeing a lot of tension right now.

　　And just to give people a little bit of a brief timeline -- Iraqi forces control this area for a while

　　and then in June ISIS took over the area and now it's kind of back in Kurdish hands?

　　Right. So in June 2014 Iraq lost control of a lot of the areas and we have this huge collapse² in the face of an ISIS offensive.

　　Over 100,000 soldiers fled and Kurdish forces moved in some of these areas -- some of them maybe took from ISIS and others just moved into into the vacuum.

　　And so Iraqi forces have been in these areas since June 2014. And that's their main demand that they return to the areas.

　　What's the likelihood that this standoff right now turns violent? Into some sort of a civil war?

　　I think at this point both sides don't want violence. Al-Abadi, the prime minister, is really trying to defuse the situation by saying there's going to be no military attack.

　　But at the same time there is this buildup of forces so that I think they are trying to, in a way,

　　intimidate³ the Kurds to withdraw from some areas but they don't want to see a fight per say.

　　But in this really tense situation there can be a small spark and things can turn violent quite easily. undefined

1 territorial   

adj.领土的，领地的

参考例句：

• The country is fighting to preserve its territorial integrity.该国在为保持领土的完整而进行斗争。
• They were not allowed to fish in our territorial waters.不允许他们在我国领海捕鱼。

2 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。

3 intimidate   

vt.恐吓，威胁

参考例句：

• You think you can intimidate people into doing what you want?你以为你可以威胁别人做任何事？
• The first strike capacity is intended mainly to intimidate adversary.第一次攻击的武力主要是用来吓阻敌方的。