WASHINGTON D.C. – Earlier this month, thousands of Iranian Kurds rioted in their capital city Mahabad where they set a hotel on fire protesting against the unexplained death of an ethnically Kurdish woman named Farinaz Khosravani, a hotel chambermaid. Kurds say the 25-year-old woman chose suicide to run away form an alleged rape attempt by an Iranian government official. For now, a brutal government crack down has brought a halt to the protests. But what happened to that woman? Are we seeing the revival of long suppressed Kurdish nationalism in Iran? To discuss this subject, Rudaw’s Namo Abdulla talks to: -Matthew McInnis, a Middle East expert serving as a non-resident fellow with the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). - John Hannah, a senior counselor at Foundation for Defense of Democracies. John has written extensively on the Kurds.
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