"We will not authorise either people with weapons or without weapons, who could try to destroy the demography and the structure of these cities," he said.

"We will not allow any fait accompli," he stressed, adding he had set out Turkey's position clearly to US Secretary of State Colin Powell in a telephone conversation on Thursday.

Gul was speaking shortly after Iraqi Kurdish fighters backed by US forces seized Kirkuk.

Both Kurds and Turkmens -- an ethnic Turkic minority in Iraq that is backed by Ankara -- claim Kirkuk and Mosul as their own.

Thousands of Kurds and Turkmens were forced out of Kirkuk by the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein under his policy of "Arabisation" in the 1970s.

Thousands of Kurds and Turkmens were driven from Kirkuk and replaced by Arabs, who were given incentives to settle in the area.

With the demise of Saddam's regime, Kurds and Turkmens are both awaiting their chance to reclaim former homes in the oil-rich region.

Demographics is important as it could determine the electoral mix of populations in an area where rival ethnic groups want to establish regional control.

SPACE.WIRE