MESOP: IRAN SENDS ASSASSIN TO KURDISTAN

A report suggests Iran send an assassin to warn the Kurds. It is unlikely that Iran send Mohammad Jafar Sahraroudi, chief of staff and advisor to Iran’s parliament speaker, to Kurdistan (who is accused of being involved in the murder of the prominent Iranian Kurdish leader Dr. Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou in 1989), because the Peshmerga are doing better than Iranian-backed militias. Sahraroudi plays an important role as an Iranian envoy involved in Iraqi Kurdish politics. This is not the first visit. There wererumours he was arrested by US forces in Kurdistan in January 2007 (or a target for arrest but escaped). And he played an important role in the negotiations of the new government, according to pro-KDP source Rudaw in April 2014, but also visited the KRG in November 2013. In fact, he visited the KRG several times to solve problems between the Iran-aligned PUK, and Turkey-aligned KDP of Barzani. The Iranians did publicly warn the Kurds against Kurdish independence plans in July 2014, after the KRG president Barzani announced this. Israel was the only country that voiced support, and Iran did not like this. Courtes Wladimir van Wilgenburg