SULAIMANI, Kurdistan Region – Iranian Kurdish armed groups have welcomed the new US strategy on Iran as unveiled by President Donald Trump on Friday.
Putting in place further sanctions on the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) is a step in the right direction, but the US should not stop there, say the armed groups, mainly present on the Kurdistan Region borders with Iran. The groups, seeking greater national and cultural rights for millions of Kurds in the country, resumed their armed struggle in 2015.
“As the Democratic Party of Kurdistan, we welcome this move by the United States. But we do not see it as strong enough,” Soran Nuri, from the Iranian Democratic Party of Kurdistan (PDK or HDK), told Rudaw.
“We hope that it will be followed by more practical actions. We hope that both the United States and Europe will show in practice, through action, efforts to prevent the interferences and adventures of the Revolutionary Guards in the countries of the region,” he continued.
Of the many armed Iranian Kurdish groups, the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI) is by far the most influential. They have had the biggest share of armed clashes with Iranian security forces across the border and inside Iran. They resumed their armed struggle about two years ago under the codename Rasan, meaning resurrection.
They say that the Iranian government and the Revolutionary Guards are one and the same.
“Putting sanctions on the Revolutionary Guards amounts to putting sanctions directly on the Islamic Republic of Iran. This is a strong response, especially since Iran was making a lot of threats that they will respond to the United States [if sanctioned], but it turned out that there was no response,” said Tahir Mahmudi, from PDKI.
Iran has been an influential player in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region where these armed groups are stationed. It backs various Shiite armed groups. The commander of the Quds force, Qassem Soleimani, visits Iraq and the Kurdistan Region on a regular basis.
Kurdistan President Masoud Barzani stated publicly earlier this year that Iran has more influence than the US, despite Washington spending billions of dollars when it invaded the country in 2003 and then again following the rise of ISIS in 2014.
A Peshmerga commander of another Kurdish-Iranian party said the new US strategy will not have a domino effect on their operations. He said the support they receive from their fellow Kurds is the backbone of their armed and political activities.
“As far as our activities are concerned, we have not put in place our strategies based on the American strategy, neither in the past, nor will we in the future. So it will have no impact on our activities in the eastern [Iranian] Kurdistan. There in eastern Kurdistan, we depend on the backing of our people,” said Hasan Rahman of the Kurdistan Organization for the Communist Party.
In his new strategy on Iran, centred on the landmark nuclear deal signed under the previous administration and growing Iranian influence across the Middle East and beyond, Trump singled out the Revolutionary Guards saying that it funds “war and terror” abroad, including in Iraq and Syria. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani denied the accusations, describing them as baseless.
Trump authorized the Treasury Department to further sanction the IRGC “for its support for terrorism,” but stopped short of declaring the group a terror organization.
The Treasury Department issued a statement on Friday announcing sanctions, arguing that Iran’s pursuit of power, which the IRGC plays a central role in, “comes at the cost of regional stability.”
Among its accusations against the IRGC, the Treasury said the force has transferred military equipment to Iraq and Syria for the Quds Force, which the US has designated a supporter of terrorism.
