Kurds realise dream as Baghdad loses grip on north Iraq

ARBIL Iraq (Reuters) - Poets wrote songs about it for generations. Guerrilla fighters holed up in the mountains trained for it for decades. But in the end, when a Kurdish army finally took control of Kirkuk, they realised the dream of their forefathers within hours, without having to fire a shot.

The collapse of Baghdad's control of northern Iraq in the face of an onslaught by Sunni insurgents has allowed Kurds to take the historic capital they regard as their Jerusalem, and suddenly put them closer than ever to their immortal goal: an independent state of their own.