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Iran
- Kurdish border porters (Kolbars) suffered another deadly week. On Thursday, near the Nowsud crossing with Iraqi Kurdistan, Iranian border guards ambushed a group of Kolbars, which resulted in the death of a 50-year-old man who fell from a cliff while trying to escape. The victim, identified as Hadi Mosazada, is from a village in Javanrud (Jwanro), Kermanshah province. On Friday, near Piranshahr crossing point, Iranian border guards attacked and severely injured 21-year-old Assad Burka. Burka later died in Piranshahr hospital. On Saturday, Iranian security forces fired on a vehicle on the main road between Bokan and Shahin Dej city, killing one Kurdish businessman and severely injuring another. On Sunday, Iranian guards shot and wounded a Kolbar on the Beyuran heights of Sardasht city. 29-year-old Mohideen Rahimi was carrying goods into Iraqi Kurdistan. According to the Kurdistan Human Rights Association (KMMK), 36 Kurdish Kolbars and businesspeople have been killed and 73 injured since the beginning of 2019.
- A group of municipality workers protested poor living conditions and unpaid wages in front of the governorate of Khorramabad city. The protesters chanted slogans calling for social justice from the Iranian regime. On Sunday, taxi drivers in Urmia held a one-day strike protesting the high prices of auto parts due to the devaluation of the Iranian rial and declining economy. The taxi drivers also complained about low income resulting from strict regulations imposed by the Iranian regime. Since last year, dozens of strikes and protests have occurred in the Kurdish region and across Iran in response to the deteriorating economic situation.
- On Wednesday, Iranian intelligence officers (Ettela’at) arrested a Kurdish labor activist named Ishaq Roohi in Sanandaj. The reasons for his arrest were unknown. Meanwhile, two Kurdish environmental activists were transferred to jail for trial after spending six months in Ettela’at detention following their December 2018 arrest. Sirwan Qurbani and Hadi Kamangar were among eight activists arrested for social activism. The fate of the other six activists remains unknown. Also in Sanandaj, the Islamic Court of Appeals postponed a ruling on the sentence of two prominent Kurdish activists: Mokhtar Zeraai and Khaled Hosseini. Both activists were sentenced to three years in prison in March 2019 for “organizing protests and cooperating with enemies against national security.” In Urmia, the Islamic Court sentenced three Kurds to between eight months and one year in prison for “membership of opposition parties.” The fate of several Kurdish activists jailed by the Ettela’at remains unclear, as Ettela’at detainees can be held without trial or the possibility of release.
Iraq
- After the top three finishers in the Kurdistan parliamentary elections reached an agreement to form a new cabinet, the Kurdistan Parliament passed an amendment to the presidency law. The amendment stipulates the president will now be elected by lawmakers. The amendment also created a new position: second vice president. On Sunday, the Kurdistan Parliament began a three-day period for the submission of presidential candidates. Following this period, Kurdish parties will have three days to file objections before voting commences. According to the agreements of the parties, Nechirvan Barzani of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan (KDP) will become the president while Mustafa Sayid Qadir, former Minister of the Peshmerga forces of the Change party (Gorran), will become the vice president. The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) did not announce their candidate for the newly formed position of second vice president. Opposition parties, including the Islamic Union (Yakgrtu) and New Generation, did not vote on the presidency amendment. Likewise, the Islamic Group (Komal) opposed certain aspects of the amendment.
- Dindar Zebari, Coordinator for International Advocacy for the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), announced that 3,371 Yazidi Kurds have been freed from Islamic State (Da’esh) terrorists since the attacks on the Yazidi region in 2014. Peshmerga and KRG intelligence have rescued a number of Yazidis, while the Syrian Kurdish forces of the People’s Defense Units (YPG) rescued nearly one hundred more. Da’esh kidnapped 6,284 Yazidis in 2014. Da’esh killed many male Yazidi captives and enslaved female Yazidis in Iraq and Syria. On Friday, another mass grave of the Yazidis was discovered near a church in Shingal. About 70 Yazidi mass graves have been found since August 2014.
- In Kirkuk, Da’esh threatened to burn Kurdish farmers’ harvests for failing to pay extortion money to the organization. Since Iranian-backed militias and Iraqi forces seized control of Kirkuk from Peshmerga forces in October 2017, the province’s security situation has deteriorated due to Da’esh attacks and the Iranian-backed militias’ harassment of civilians. Meanwhile, the Kirkuk provincial council once again failed to hold a session to discuss Kirkuk’s allocated oil share budget from Baghdad and the funds that are “illegally” used by the acting governor Rakan Saed. Saed was appointed by former Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al Abadi.
- A group of Arab families, who moved into Kirkuk during Saddam Hussein’s Arabization campaign, attacked the Kurdish sub-district of Sargaran and took over several Kurdish homes. The group was supported by security forces in charge of Kirkuk province since October 16, 2017. The Kurdish families protested the move and called for the Kurdistan region to react against the re-Arabization of Kirkuk by the current acting governor. Sargaran is a historically Kurdish area west of Kirkuk that suffered tremendous demographic change under the former Iraqi regime.
Syria
- In an interview with the New York Times, General Mazloum Kobani, commander-in-chief of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), described the U.S. withdraw from Syria as a “mistake” and said he is still fully prepared to defend his militia’s hard-fought gains accumulated through years of fighting Da’esh. Kobani’s comments come after repeated threats from the Russia-backed Assad regime to retake the Kurdish region and Turkish plans to invade the region following a U.S. departure from Syria.
- On Friday, Turkish-backed Syrian jihadists shelled multiple SDF positions. Most of the shelling took place in the rural areas south of Al-Bab and made use of rockets and mortars. Turkish-backed jihadists have recently increased bombardment of SDF positions, especially neat Tel Rifaat. On Sunday, Turkish military forces shot a Kurdish farmer working his land near the Syrian border town of Tal Abyad (Gire Spi). The farmer, Khalil al Saleh, was transferred to a hospital in Tal Abyad for treatment. In Afrin, the Turkish military and two jihadist factions bombarded the Shera district with heavy weapons in attempts to prevent further resistance by some Kurdish forces against the Turkish invasion of March 2018. Afrin region remains unstable and 400,000 Kurds, afraid of returning to Afrin, remain displaced in rural areas surrounding Aleppo.
- On Monday, a mine targeting a civilian car exploded in Raqqa and caused property damage. On Wednesday, two explosions killed a total of five civilians in the city of Manbij. One was caused by a motorcycle bomb and another occurred near a checkpoint north of the city. Da’esh sleeper cells have begun carrying out an increasing number of terrorist attacks following the loss of their physical “Caliphate.”
Turkey
- The hunger strikes carried out by Kurdish activists and politicians demanding an end to the isolation imposed on imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan and political prisoners in Turkey reached 188 days. While hundreds of Kurdish political prisoners remain on hunger strikes, 30 are on “death fast.” Previously, the Pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) demanded the international community break its silence on the hunger strikers across Turkey and warned of health issues facing the strikers. So far, six prisoners have ended their lives to raise awareness of their situation. The Turkish governor of the mostly Kurdish Siirt Province has banned all forms of hunger strikes and protests. Meanwhile, several mothers of the political prisoners are on trial for holding protests in front of the prisons in solidarity with their sons and daughters who are on hunger strikes.
- The HDP will not participate in the rerun election of Istanbul, a move that could help the Turkish opposition candidate of the Republican Party (CHP). The HDP also withdrew from participation in several cities during local elections, a tactic intended to weaken the Islamist ruling party of Justice and Development (AKP).