This is where Iraq's first oil well was discovered in 1927, and the city sits on top of a reserve that some estimates say could account for nearly one third of Iraqi oil production.

Much of the Kirkuk oil is exported via an underground pipeline to Yumurtalik on Turkey's Mediterranean coast. The pipeline was closed by the Turkish authorities in 1990 following Iraq's invasion of Kuwait and was only reopened in 1996.

The town is 300 kilometres (200 miles) directly north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad and has a population of around 190,000. The city and surrounding area are populated mainly by Kurdish and Turcoman minorities.

Originally populated mostly by Kurds, thousands of Kirkuk's Kurds were forced out during Saddam Hussein's regime. Displaced persons have been waiting for years in nearby towns and refugee camps to return to Kirkuk.

Following the 1991 Gulf war, Kurdish insurgents briefly captured the town under US encouragement, before Saddam's troops brutally suppressed the uprising.

Turkey fears that if the Iraqi Kurds control Kirkuk's oil resources they could seek independence, triggering a similar move among the restless fellow Kurds just across the border in southern Turkey.

The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), which have shared control of parts of Iraqi Kurdistan since 1991, have named Kirkuk as their future capital.

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