MESOPOTAMIA NEWS : THE WEEK IN KURDISTAN (IRAN) – AN UPDATE

EAST KURDISTAN (IRAN) 4. June 2019

Iran

Last week, Iranian authorities continued to crackdown on the activities of Kurdish border workers known as Kolbars. On Tuesday, Iranian border guards ambushed a truck carrying goods in the vicinity of the Ganawa border crossing near Marivan, injuring the truck’s driver and forcing a group Kolbars to flee. The border guards then confiscated the belongings of the fleeing Kolbars. Also, on Tuesday, two Kolbars were killed and four severely wounded near Piranshahr. The Kurdish rights group Hengaw, after speaking with one of the wounded Kolbars, reported Iranian-backed Iraqi militias carried out the ambush in conjunction with elements of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The witness also told Hengaw that the militias tortured Kolbars taken captive following the attack. Kurdish human rights organizations have recently accused Iraqi militias loyal to the Iranian regime of carrying out attacks against Kolbars.

On Sunday, a group of teachers held a protest in Marivan against the imprisonment of Kurdish teachers for protesting the conditions of schools and unpaid wages. The teachers held signs displaying the names of the jailed educators and called on the Iranian regime to free them. On Monday, in Sanandaj, members of the cultural organization Nozheen held a protest in front of the city court and called for the release of three of the organization’s members who were detained last week. Adris Manbary, Raza Mohamadi, and Rebwar Manbary were detained without charge by security forces.
A principal from a school in Mehabad was dismissed after a video was leaked showing students dancing to music with their teachers. A prosecutor of the Islamic Revolutionary Court has also opened a case against individuals linked to the video.
The Kurdistan Human Rights Association (KMMK) recently released a report on the victims of several earthquakes in the Kurdish region since 2017. According to the report, the Iranian regime’s discriminatory policies have resulted in failure to rebuild Kurdish cities and lack of compensation for those affected. Thousands of earthquake victims remain displaced and poverty has forced many in the affected areas to resort to selling organs.

Newsletter