Erbil is the Iraq you don't know about from the news. Spared from the carnage seen elsewhere in the country, the capital of Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region calls itself - with a mix of aspiration and optimism - "the second Dubai", because of the many new shopping malls, five-star hotels and skyscrapers under construction.

But, unlike Dubai, humans have lived here for nearly 10,000 years, making it one of the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities. Erbil has also been capturing the world's attention for all the right reasons, with National Geographic and The New York Times both listing Kurdistan as a top travel destination for 2011.

Arbil, Iraq: Kurdistan, the semi-autonomous region in northern Iraq, expects to attract more than five million tourists by 2015, according to government sources. New data reveal that 800,000 tourists made a visit in 2009, while last year they totalled more than 1.3 million.

By the end of this year, the Ministry of Tourism and Municipalities expects to welcome more than two million tourists to Iraqi Kurdistan.

"While the number of tourists to most Middle Eastern countries is dropping because of the security and political situations, in the Kurdistan Region they have been increasing beyond imagination," said Sirwan Shafiq, media director of the Arbil-based General Directorate of Tourism, the entity associated with the Ministry of Tourism and Municipalities.

"If these numbers continue to rise, we expect to receive at least five million by 2015."

The Kurdistan region is appealing because not many outsiders come here. It is still authentic. The Citadel in Erbil dates back at least 7,000 years and is considered the oldest continuously inhabited settlement in the world. When the government forced the residents of the Citadel to move so they could rehabilitate it, they let one family stay, ensuring it would maintain that status. In 2009, the Citadel was temporarily placed on the UNESCO World Heritage list and will receive a more permanent spot once it is rehabilitated.

St. Matthew's Monastery, or Dayro d-Mor Matay, as it is known locally, is another ancient site tucked into the mountains about 20 miles from Mosul. The monastery dates to the fourth century and features a chapel and a crypt that holds the remains of Matthew, a Turkish-born monk who died in 411. Unusual for a tourist site, it doesn't allow photography, but the monks who live there are friendly and showed an Iraqi reporter and me around, leading us into caves where the monks hid from their attackers and showing us an ancient chain that villagers would put around their necks to say a prayer. More recently, Christians who fled the violence in nearby Mosul sought refuge in the tiny rooms of the monastery.
The Kurdistan region is studded with similar reminders of its bloody and not-so-distant past, including the Red Museum in Sulaimaniyah, a converted jail where members of Saddam Hussein's regime tortured and murdered men, women, and children as part of a genocidal campaign against the Kurds. Many of these atrocities occurred in places so breathtakingly beautiful that it's hard to reconcile these postcard vistas (not available yet on postcards) with the more-familiar images of Iraq from TV news.

"It is one of most historical and archeologically endowed places in the world," said Douglas Layton, general manager of The Other Iraq Tours. "It is also scenic, unlike most of the rest of the Middle East—crisscrossed with dramatic rivers, lakes, and snow-covered mountains."

Considered an oasis of peace and stability in a historically volatile region, the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region in northeastern Iraq is drawing a growing stream of curious Western visitors to its ancient cities, snowcapped mountains, and bustling bazaars. 

Iraq is poised to be a future tourism hotspot, reveals the new WTM Global Trends Report.

The report, in association with Euromonitor International, shows Iraqi tourism is growing fast with increased airline and hotel capacity following the country’s successful attendance at World Travel Market 2009 – its first visit to a travel and tourism trade event for 10 years.

"Sandi [Toksvig] talks to journalist Michael Howard about Kurdistan in Northern Iraq and what the area has to offer tourists and hears from Dr Janet Hamilton about her trip there to follow the road her father built in the 1920s."

While most people still think of Iraq as a place of extremist violence, some say Iraqi Kurdistan is a vision of how the country could be. Erbil, the region's capital, gives off a sense of prosperity, while the whole area has a reputation for liberal tolerance.

The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) today lauded the US Department of State’s updated guidelines for travel to Iraq , affirming the relative safety and security of the Kurdistan Region.

Utopia: an imaginary place where everything is perfect. Living in Kurdistan the past three months has been as close to utopia as possible. I am here training local Kurds how to teach English for an elementary school to be opened in September. I had no expectations coming to Iraq and the Middle East because I had no idea what to expect. I have been pleasantly surprised with life here.