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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A senior commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on Tuesday accused Kurdish opposition groups of being behind the latest wave of protests that has gripped Iran since the death of a Kurdish woman in police custody in Tehran nearly two weeks ago.
More than 70 protesters have been killed by the security forces as the protest see no sign of abetting with thousands of people taking to the street on Tuesday night chanting “Death to the dictator” and attacking the IRGC armored vehicles with Molotov cocktails and stones.
“We will not allow the formation of any threats in our surroundings,” IRGC Deputy Commander for Operations Abbas Nilforoushan said. “The shelling of the counter-revolutionary positions and their bases … in the northern Iraqi region is in the pursuit of this strategic approach. We have informed our friends in the [Kurdistan] Region that taking up position and establishing bases by the enemies of the Islamic revolution on their land is not acceptable.”
“Wherever the counterrevolutionaries establish bases and become a source of operations against the security of the Islamic Republic and the Iranian people and try to coordinate or lead terrorist moves they will be targeted,” he said. “The bases that we targeted recently had the greatest role in the riots of past days.”
The IRGC on Wednesday shelled Kurdistan Region’s border area for the fifth consecutive day, a local official confirmed to Rudaw. The force reportedly used “suicide drones” in targeting the site, Hengaw Organizations for Human Rights said in a tweet.
The authorities in Tehran have been in a state of panic since the Kurdish opposition groups based in Kurdistan Region in Iraq called for a general strike across the Kurdish areas in western Iran on September 19, setting off the recent wave of unrest across the country.
Welcomed by Kurdish residents in the west of Iran, the announcement of the strike was triggered by the death of Mahsa (Zhina) Amini who was arrested by the so-called morality police in Tehran and died in police custody. Her family blames the police for her death.
The protests spread across the country and on Tuesday night residents of the port of Chabahar in southeast Iran were reported to be in charge of the city after setting several government buildings and bases of security forces on fire.
The guards and other Iranian security forces have taken a heavy-handed approach and have detained thousands of protesters, lawyers, activists, students, women rights activists, and at least 20 journalists. In the past, security forces have subjected detainees to sexual abuse, flogging, and electric shocks.
The UN has expressed concern over the violent response by the security forces and the UK representative to the UN Human Rights Council called on Iran to “carry out independent, transparent investigations into” Amini’s death and “and the excessive violence used against subsequent protests.”
The latest wave of protest comes as Iran and the world powers are in a deadlock over reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.
Iran Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian played down the protest and said that the US “has taken some steps towards giving us guarantees” about the nuclear deal. Abdollahian claimed on Twitter that his country was described as an “island of stability” by numerous officials at the UN General Assembly in the past days.
It is not clear if the foreign minister was aware of the significance of the phrase “island of stability” used by former US president Jimmy Carter to describe the reign of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi in December 1977 one year before the monarchy was toppled.
"I am assuring them that there is not a big deal going on in Iran, there is not going to be regime change in Iran. Do not play to the emotions of the Iranian people," Abdollahian told NPR on Tuesday.
Another sticking point in the revival of the nuclear deal is the IRGC’s missile and drone capabilities.
“In the field of missile capabilities, we will not negotiate with anyone, we will not be disarmed by ourselves,” IRGC Deputy Commander Nilforoushan told the guards’ Tasnim News. “The Western side understood that under no circumstances we negotiate with any other country or side over our military power one of the elements of which is the missile and drone capabilities as well as our projected power Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Kurdish human rights organization Hengaw said that at least 18 Kurdish protesters have been killed with nearly thousands wounded. The exact number of how many people who have been detained is not clear but Kurdish Human Rights Network put the number at hundreds.
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