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Iran
- The Iranian regime detained more Kurds during its continuing crackdown on Kurdish political activity last week. In Sanandaj, Iranian intelligence officers (Ettela’at) arrested a Kurdish activist named Soran Azizi for “cooperation with a Kurdish opposition party.” The Ettela’at in Sanandaj also arrested a Kurdish labor activist named Aram Zindi, who had been advocating for the rights of previously arrested workers. In Marivan, two Kurds, Karo Kawa and Sina Jasat, were detained by Iranian security forces last Tuesday. In Oshnavieh (Shinno), Ettela’at officers detained a Kurdish student, Mohammed Iqbal, without a warrant or court order. In Bokan, the Islamic Revolutionary Court sentenced a Kurdish bookstore owner named Mustafa Rahimi to three months in prison for selling Bibles. Concurrently, in Divandareh (Diwandara), the fate of a Kurdish man named Sadiq Saifi who was arrested three weeks ago remains unknown. According to the Kurdistan Association for Human Rights (KMMK) Saifi was accused of “aiding Kurdish parties.” Since the beginning of 2019, Iranian authorities have detained about 275 Kurds, mostly activists, in Iranian Kurdistan.
Iraq
- The United States Vice President Mike Pence held a phone conversation with the President of Iraqi Kurdistan Naichervan Barzani on August 27. A press release from the Office of the Vice President claimed the conversation focused on the security situation in Iraq and the role of the Iranian-backed militias, disputed territories between Baghdad and Erbil, and ongoing talks between the Government of Iraq and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). On the issue of Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), the statement said, “Vice President Pence emphasized the United States’ concern that Iran-backed militias continue to undermine Iraq’s security and sovereignty and that the U.S. Government will consider additional steps to degrade such groups’ influence.”
- A KRG delegation visited Baghdad to meet with Iraqi officials and address the normalization of the situation in Kirkuk. The province has been afflicted with a lack of security and political instability since Iranian-backed militias and Iraqi forces seized control in 2017. The Kurds are demanding the end of military rule in Kirkuk prior to the local elections set to be held on April 1, 2020. Kurdish representatives also met with their Arab and Turkmen counterparts to discuss the election of a Kurdish government by the Kurdish-majority provincial council. The Islamic State (Da’esh) has exploited Kirkuk’s lack of security and launched an increasing number of attacks in the province which have disproportionately targeted the Kurdish district of Daquq and displaced many families.
- The Turkish military launched airstrikes targeting two vehicles it claimed were transporting members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). The strikes occurred in the Choman District and a village near Duhok and are part of the Turkish military’s continuing incursion inside Iraqi Kurdistan. Turkey claims the campaign, which was launched in May, is targeting the PKK headquarters in the Qandil Mountains, though continuing Turkish operations in the Kurdistan region have resulted in numerous civilian casualties and the displacement of thousands.
Syria
- The Autonomous Administration of North and East of Syria (AANES) announced the withdrawal of heavy weapons and Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (YPG) personnel from areas designated by a “safe zone” agreement between the U.S. and Turkey. A statement released by the AANES claimed, “The first practical steps were taken on the 24th of this month in the area of Serêkaniyê (Ras Al-Ain) by removing some earth mounds and withdrawing a group of YPG and heavy weapons to their new points and handing over the border points to the local forces.” Meanwhile, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan again threatened to let Turkish soldiers seize control of the area without U.S. involvement. The region’s residents continue to oppose the Turkish invasion, as additional tribal conferences and protests were held in Geri Spi (Rasalin) and Deir Ez Zor province.
- The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) carried out two raids resulting in the capture of two senior Da’esh terrorists last week. One of the captured terrorists is a Belgian citizen named Anouar Haddouchi. Haddouchi planned the Paris and Brussel attacks in 2015, slaughtered more than a hundred men in Raqqa from 2014-2017, and was overseeing Da’esh’s sleeper cells in eastern Syria at the time of his capture. The other Da’esh terrorist was captured in Deir ez Zour and is a financial official named Mohammed Ramadan.
- Da’esh terrorists detonated a motorcycle IED in Shaddadi that killed a 13-year-old boy and wounded three others. Simultaneously, an IED severely injured a 19-year-old man in the Kurdish town of Ahres, which is in Aleppo Governorate.
Turkey
- A court ruling issued in Ankara called for the release of the Kurdish politician Selahattin Demirtas from custody and the dismissal of all terrorism charges against him. Despite the court’s ruling, however, Demirtas remains in prison. The Turkish government jailed Demirtas, the former co-chair of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) ,on November 4, 2016 after he challenged Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
- For the second week in a row, Kurds and the pro-Kurdish HDP protested the Turkish government’s removal of elected Kurdish mayors and their replacement with government approved trustees in three major cities of the Kurdish region. In Diyarbakir (Amed), Van, and Mardin, protesters took to the streets and were sometimes attacked by police. In Mardin, the government appointed trustee dismissed 150 government officials in a political move to decrease Kurdish representation in the local administration. The Turkish mayor of Istanbul and member of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), Akram Imamoglu, visited the removed Kurdish mayors in a show of solidarity against the government’s decision. Meanwhile, the Turkish government launched a new crackdown against Kurds and arrested a number of Kurds and HDP members throughout the country. Turkish police detained 15 Kurds in Izmir and Muğla while a Kurdish politician, Melike Güzel, was detained in Diyarbakir.