Iran missile strike opens door to escalation with Kurdish armed groups
An Iranian missile attack on Iranian Kurdish fighters in Iraqi Kurdistan has raised the risk of intensified fighting in western Iran while heightening the chances of localized confrontations taking on an international dimension.
The patience of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) with Iranian Kurdish groups operating from northern Iraq was wearing thin. Spiraling violence in western Iran between Iranian Kurdish fighters and security forces had been claiming an increasing number of lives. Meanwhile, Iraqi Kurdish authorities were doing little to reign in the groups based on their territory. Simultaneously faced with escalating pressure from the United States, Tehran likely felt that something had to be done, that a message had to be sent. The apparent response was multi-pronged.
On Sept. 7, IRGC drones surveilled a six-member unit of the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK) in the mountains of western Iran. The fighters were surrounded by Iranian forces on a mountain near the village of Palangan. PJAK sources believe at least three of the fighters were eventually killed. There has been no information about the others.
At dawn the following day, three Iranian Kurdish political prisoners were paraded in a prison near Tehran before being sent to the gallows. Meanwhile, Iran had deployed seven missile batteries near Azarshahr, in East Azerbaijan province, opposite a fort across the border in Iraqi Kurdistan.
When the missiles were launched, a group of senior officials of the opposition Iranian Kurdistan Democratic Party (PDK) had gathered for an important meeting at its Iraqi headquarters, a sprawling fort built by the Russians in 1977 for President Saddam Hussein’s army. PDK and fellow Kurdish opposition groups were on alert, as assassinations of their members had risen this year after Iran implemented a campaign targeting the border area where the parties are based.
