BAGHDAD was quiet and calm yesterday as news of Iraqi troop involvement in the northern Kurdish provinces filtered through the official media channels. Television announcements of the troop involvement interrupted programmes at noon, in the evening and again after midnight during the showing of the US movie Beethoven on the Shabab TV, the young people's channel run by President Saddam Hussein's son, Odai.
Baghdad residents observed with interest but no apparent anxiety as one news report after another said Iraqi troops had encircled the northern Kurdish city of Arbil, where the independently elected Kurdish Parliament has its seat.
Many residents of the Iraqi capital showed a quite satisfaction that Kurds had effectively invited Baghdad to help defend them against another Kurdish group backed by neighbouring Iran.
"The point is that when Jalal Talabani involved Iranian troops on Iraqi soil - even if it is Iraqi Kurdistan, he was inviting a response from Baghdad," said one Iraqi political observer, chiding the leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan for his alliance with Tehran.
"I am satisfied that the Kurds have begun to re enter the national fold of Iraq," said the observer, sipping sweetened tea in the sweltering 48 degree Baghdad heat.
Iraqi television began playing Kurdish songs and music and showing footage of holiday resorts in the plush green valleys of the province of Erbil, shortly after the Iraqi troop involvement in the northern provinces was announced. A young man, singing in Arabic but wearing traditional Kurdish garb, sang songs of Arab and Kurdish unity as Kurdish dancers moved to the tunes in what appears to have been a previously recorded programme, possibly filmed before the Kurdish fallout with the Baghdad government in 1991.
However, not all Baghdad residents were confident this weekend that the Iraqi troop involvement in the Kurdish areas was wise.
"We were hoping that the oil for food deal would materialise by mid September or early October at the latest and this may have ye another `delay effect' on this," said a professor at the Mustansan University.
"We want Iraq to open up to the world, not remain a pariah state," said the professor.