ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iran aired a two-minute video late Tuesday purporting to show the confession of a Kurdish teenager from Piranshahr in West Azerbaijan province over the killing of an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) member, despite an armed group claiming responsibility for the killing earlier last week, as assassinations and clashes continue to mount across the country’s Kurdish regions.
In a video aired by Iran’s Fars news agency, the teenager appears with his face blurred and no details about his identity disclosed. He is heard saying, “Last year I was a member of the Free Life Party of Kurdistan (PJAK) for five months. Through Instagram, I contacted the Democratic Party [the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI)], then through WhatsApp they told me I had to assassinate Islam Kak Darwishi.”
Later in the video, the teenager appears to confess to killing Darwishi with a gun that he says was left for him near an electric pole. The killing took place late on September 11, according to the video.
Since then, several human rights groups have reported the arrest of Arzhin Jondi, a 16-year-old Kurdish teenager from the village of Kuper in Piranshahr, West Azerbaijan province.
The Paris-based Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) reported on September 15 that Jundi had been arrested by the IRGC Intelligence Organisation and was allegedly being tortured and pressured into making a forced confession over his involvement in the killing of the IRGC member. According to KHRN, “Unidentified armed individuals opened fire on him.”
KHRN told Rudaw English on Wednesday that “the alleged and forced confession of Jundi regarding the killing of the IRGC member has increased the probability of his execution.” The rights group said Jundi’s whereabouts remain unknown and that he has been denied access to a lawyer and family visits since his arrest.
The alleged confession comes against the backdrop of a Kurdish armed group, Khori Hiwa (Sun of Hope), claiming responsibility soon after the killing on September 12, accusing Darvishi of working with Iranian security forces and alleging that he had served as an intelligence commander with the IRGC.
A day after the killing, Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), without naming the detainee, announced that “the perpetrator responsible for the assassination of Eslam Kak Darvishi by agents of the ‘counter-revolution’ and ‘mercenaries’ was identified and arrested less than 24 hours after the crime.”
Jundi is not the only Kurdish teenager to have been detained in recent months. In another recent case involving Kurdish teenagers in western Iran, 17-year-old Siamak Mofidi and 16-year-old Soroush Enayati, from West Azerbaijan province, were arrested on September 5 after security forces raided their homes without judicial warrants.
They were charged with “acting against national security,” “propaganda against the system," and “disturbing public order,” and were reportedly interrogated without access to a lawyer, according to the Kurdistan Press Agency (Kurdpa).
