The depths of oppression for Iranian Kurds
Thank you so much. Let me please start by thanking WKI for such a timely webinar. I’m going to structure my discussion around two main pivots for the first part. I’m going to give you a brief report on major events and share with you some statistics that reveal the depth of systematic human rights abuses in Rojava. For the second part of my discussion, I will argue about some measures that the United States can take to use the Kurdish factor to its full capacity as one of the tools in its regional and in its foreign relations policy toolkit.
Let me start by describing the depth of oppression that is going on against Kurds in Iran using both numbers and also analysis of the hidden mechanisms of what we call ethnic domination in Iran. I’m going to start with statistics. I gathered these statistics from various human rights organizations, such as KPA and Hega. I also checked parts of this information in numbers with reports from other non-Kurdish Iranian organizations that report on the human rights situation in Iran like Haran. In 2021 Iranian regime executed at least 48 Kurdish citizens among them were the famous case of Haider Ghorbani. I’m sure that you’ve heard of him a lot. He was a political prisoner who got executed at the end of the year. Ghorbani case specifically has analytical significance for understanding the actual relationship between different branches of the government in Iran. It also sheds more light on the real locus of power in the whole structure of the regime. He was executed despite the fact that even the higher court in Iran nulled the conviction. They decided that there was a lack of evidence for his conviction in the lower court, but amazingly the security of the regime, or to be more specific, the organization of the deep state in Kurdistan like the IRGC, represented the leader in the province and the intelligence ministry insisted on execution. Then it was carried out in a very secretive manner without letting his family or lawyer be notified. During this year more than 550 Kurdish citizens got arrested. Human rights organizations actually believed that the actual number is higher because their estimation is that there are more than 100 cases that have not been publicized, and we don’t know anything about them.
The majority of them have been accused because of their political activities and have been charged with membership or partisanship in Kurdish political parties. These detainees face various types of systematic tortures and violations. As a result of this situation, I can say, 18 prisoners died in jail in 2021. A majority of them died in very suspicious circumstances. More than 235 Kurdish citizens have been directly shot at by the police, border control agency, and by IRGC. 65 of them lost their lives in these shootings. When I’m talking about these numbers, it doesn’t include the victims of landmines that have been planted there by the regime, landmines injured or killed 18 people. The systematic attack on Kurdish culture also has continued more severely during this year. These attacks are part of the strategy to continue what we call ethnic domination in Iran. Ethnic domination is entrenched in the formal discourse of the state and actually acts through the ridiculing of Kurdish culture in mass media, public culture, pop culture, and in the bureaucracy. As well, the reproduction of knowledge in the country comes from the other side. Also, the security apparatus continues to attack those who are trying to somehow help this culture or promote the Kurdish culture. For example, in the case of Zara. Well, Zara Mohammadi was a Kurdish language teacher who was sentenced for five years imprisonment in 2021. There is another instance that is not very well known to the public, and it’s the case of Kaywan Menwi, another Kurdish language teacher that was arrested in November 2021. There haven’t been any contacts to lawyers or the family so far. So, we have no idea what the situation is. In 2021, the Iranian regime continued shelling and bombarding the position of Iranian Kurdish political parties. In September, the IRGC attacked the borders of the KRG with the pretext of the presence of KDPI forces. They mainly targeted civilians and the livestock of the KRG citizens., There was not a single wounded Peshmerga soldier. So, what that says to us is that there weren’t any Peshmerga there, and if there was probably one of them should have been, for example, wounded. In April and May, the presence of Kurdish Peshmerga forces in towns and villages inside Iranian Kurdistan actually increased during the past year. For example, in two cases footage of Peshmerga forces in the village of Baneh, Kurdistan Province, which is deep in the borders of Iranian Kurdistan, and also in the city Oshnavieh (Shinno) another city in the west Azerbaijani Province, which is deep inside Iranian Kurdistan. The footage of the Peshmerga went viral on social media. From the Kurdish political society side, the Kurdish political parties, at least the main Kurdish political parties, took some steps to get closer and to ramp up some sort of cooperation that they have already started.
You already know that the major parties have formed an umbrella organization among themselves called the center for cooperation. They started discussing taking this cooperation to a different level by including military and foreign relations issues in the agenda of the center and somehow creating some foundations for effective coordination between the parties in both of these realms. The regime signals from the other side the full militarization of Iranian Kurdistan by appointing governors with heavy military and security backgrounds for the four main Kurdish political provinces. Turning to the economic side of the issues, the depreciation of the Iranian currency, corruption, and stuff like this has led to people having to face unprecedented hardship and quite astonishingly the situation always finds some room to get worse. So the moment you believe that the economy has hit the rock bottom, you realize that it still can go down even more. The fact that Iran is formed in a way that Kurdistan has always been a periphery has exacerbated the negative effects of economic situations in Iran. This has led to an unprecedented number of suicides specifically among youth in Iranian Kurdistan. The economic pressures, the emotional pressure, and the political pressure place these multidimensional pressures on Kurdish society in Iran. This actually has led to a large number, a huge number of suicides among youth in, Iranian Kurdistan.
Recommendations of the United States
As for the United States, I believe it is imperative for the United States to understand that there is still room for the Kurdish factor to play in favor of U.S. interests in the region. The Kurdish factor can play a significant role in the global conflict between democracy and authoritarianism. To be able to fully utilize these capacities the United States needs some infrastructure. I believe with the current situation and with the current approach, it’s hard to get the United States to that point of readiness. It is important for the United States to realize that with the previous approach, the conventional approach of making states the center of the policy, they cannot get to that point that can utilize the capacities of these communities in the region, especially the Kurds. It is in favor of their interests, global challenges. We live in a world that’s non-state actors are basically getting more important. Communities are becoming more important in the Middle East. For example, Kurdish communities inside the Middle East have helped the main agendas during various American administrations. So I would suggest two things for the United States to do first. It is important for the United States to have a special envoy on Kurdish issues. There are more than 40 million Kurds in the region. They have reached a higher level of national awareness and they are playing a significant role, and it is important for the United States to have a special envoy. They need an envoy in order to be able to actually build this infrastructure and these foundations that are required. The United States has already experienced how to track two diplomacy helps its diplomatic apparatus face global challenges. I believe expanding this kind of diplomacy in the Kurdish political society in the region will have the same effect, especially the effect of empowering the Kurdish society to be able to play a significant role in these global challenges. Such as confronting authoritarianism, but also it can help the United States to actually face other sorts of challenges like environmental challenges. I believe that expanding this track to diplomacy with Kurdish society, with Kurdish political society, especially in the Iranian part of Kurdistan can be very effective.
Will the Iranian Deal Happen? If it does, will it change conditions for the Kurds?
Thank you so much. So, we are getting some conflicting signals from both sides. From some of them, we hear that the speed is not what they expected. And for example, from the United States’ side, they’re not satisfied with the pace of the negotiations. And from the other side, for example, we have seen some mixed signals from the Iranian side. We have seen signals from the leadership, that the leaders of Iran, are saying that it’s okay to negotiate and even interact with the enemy. It doesn’t mean they’re actually taking over. It doesn’t mean that we are giving up everything. So, this signal basically has been interpreted as the willingness of Iran to do the deal and to actually conclude the negotiations. But from the other side, as I mentioned, there are signals that the Iranians are not that eager for that. They’re not that serious and, you know, about giving the required pace to the negotiations. There is this belief that the Iranians are actually giving these conflicting signals to kill time and to be able to return to a point that it will be like the previous situation. So, this whole situation, you know, my consideration about these negotiations is not whether the richer deal or not. You know, it’s not a deal per set say, matters, rather it is the way that the United States has been actually sidelined. The free world has sidelined all other issues and matters for the sake of these negotiations, and that proves that they’re futile and they don’t have any real results. The United States has decided to be silent about the violations of human rights. The United States has decided to ignore everything about Iran, and even the administration decided to lower the numbers that the previous administration talked about with regards to the numbers that Iranians killed