Rival Kurd Leaders Amassing Fortunes

A new class of rich traders and clan leaders has amassed considerable wealth through sanctions-busting trade with Turkey, punitive taxes on the region's 4 million people and squeezing the dozens of aid agencies operating in the enclave.

Clashes between the guerrilla armies of the two rival warlords, Jalal Talabani and Massoud Barzani, owe as much to hunger for war booty and the economic interests of this Kurdish elite as to the leaders' personal financial and political ambitions.

Each group