Erbil

Erbil's citadel has been continuously inhabited for at least 6,000 years, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied settlements on Earth—a claim supported by UNESCO, which designated the Citadel of Erbil a World Heritage Site in 2014. The tell (artificial mound) rises 25-30 meters above the surrounding plain, built from millennia of accumulated human habitation layers. Each civilization—Sumerian, Assyrian, Persian, Arab, Ottoman, Kurdish—added another stratum to the mound, creating a physical geology of human occupation.

Modern Erbil is the capital of Iraq's Kurdistan Region, an autonomous territory with its own government, military (the Peshmerga), and—critically—its own oil contracts. The Kurdistan Regional Government signed independent production-sharing agreements with international oil companies including ExxonMobil, Chevron, and Genel Energy, bypassing Baghdad's central oil ministry. This oil autonomy generates billions in revenue and makes Erbil the administrative center of what functions as a semi-independent petroleum state within Iraq.

The city boomed after 2003. While Baghdad and southern Iraq descended into sectarian violence, Erbil's relative stability attracted investment, construction, and refugees. The population surged past 900,000 as the city built malls, international hotels, and a new airport. Real estate prices in some districts rivaled Dubai. But the boom depended on high oil prices and Baghdad's willingness to transfer budget allocations—both of which proved unreliable.

Erbil demonstrates how autonomous regions within unstable states create their own economic logic: attract foreign investment through stability, monetize natural resources through independent contracts, and build institutional capacity faster than the parent state. The risk is existential—if Baghdad revokes autonomy or oil prices collapse permanently, Erbil's semi-independence loses its economic foundation.