Iranian Kurdish rebels hire law firm to lobby Trump administration
The Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan now has lobbyists covering both the executive and legislative branches.
An Iranian Kurdish armed group has hired a new lobbyist to reach out to the Donald Trump administration.
The Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan hired Washington law firm the Cogent Law Group in December to “promote and develop cooperative relations with the US government,” according to newly disclosed lobbying filings. The firm was paid $40,000 up front to organize a “single high-level meeting with a senior official of the executive branch of the United States Government” and a “single media interview in the United States.”
Although Cogent will be dealing with Komala’s US representative, Salah Bayaziddi, the contract was signed by the party’s secretary-general, Abdullah Mohtadi. It comes at a fraught time for the left-wing group as the Trump administration fine-tunes its Iran policy.
Bloomberg reported last month that the State Department had ordered US diplomats to limit their interactions with certain Iranian opposition groups — including Komala — to avoid jeopardizing potential diplomacy with Iran. Just one week later, however, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo overrode the order following pressure from right-wing hawks, according to The Daily Beast.
