Tehran Orders New Attacks On Iraq’s Kurdistan Region

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) has fired on targets in Iraq's northern Kurdish region, the latest round of attacks on the area in recent weeks.

Iranian media, including, IRNA, Tasnim and the Fars news agency, which is affiliated with the IRGC, said bases of "terrorist groups" in the Kurdish region of Iraq were targeted with missiles and drones.

According to Tariq Haidari, the mayor of northern Iraqi city of Koye, at least one person was killed and 10 others were wounded in the attacks on the headquarters of an Iranian-Kurdish party in this city near the capital of Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region Erbil.

The AP news agency quoted a security official from the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran, one of the exiled groups targeted, as saying they had suffered casualties but did not provide more details. The official was not authorized to talk to the media and spoke on condition of anonymity. The party has waged an insurgency against the Iranian government since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

In September, the IRGC issued a statement saying such attack operations would continue as long as the bases of "terrorist groups" were not removed and as long as regional authorities "do not act according to their commitments."

The IRGC has accused Iraq-based Kurdish groups of "attacking and infiltrating Iran to sow insecurity and riots and spread unrest" amid protests that erupted nearly two months ago in Iran over the death of Mahsa Amini.

The 22-year-old died on September 16, three days after being detained in Tehran by the morality police for allegedly breaching Iran's strict rules on head scarves.

The protests started in Amini’s hometown of Saghez in Iran's Kurdistan region and spread to dozens of cities and towns across Iran. Tehran has accused, without providing evidence, that Kurdish groups in northern Iraq have been supporting the demonstrations.

The wave of protests and the government crackdown that followed have left scores of demonstrators dead and seen thousands detained.

By RFE/RL

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