PJAK

The Party of Free Life of Kurdistan^[2][3] or Free Life Party of Kurdistan^[4][5] or Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan^[6][7] (Kurdish):^[8][9] (پارتی ژیانی ئازادی کوردستان or Partiya Jiyana Azad a Kurdistanê ) or PJAK, also sometimes mistakenly written as PEJAK, is a militant Kurdish nationalist group with bases in the mountainous regions of northern Iraq^[10], has been carrying out numerous attacks in western Iran, southern Turkey and the northeastern parts of Syria where the Kurdish populations live.^[10]

PJAK is a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Confederation (Koma Civakên Kurdistan or KCK), which is an alliance of outlawed Kurdish groups and divisions led by an elected Executive Council. The PKK, described as a terrorist organization internationally by a number of states and supranational organizations, including the USA, NATO and the EU,^[11][12] is also a member of KCK.^[13]. ^[14] A recent New York Times article stated that PJAK and PKK "appear to a large extent to be one and the same, and share the same goal: fighting campaigns to win new autonomy and rights for Kurds in Iran and Turkey. They share leadership, logistics and allegiance to Abdullah Ocalan, the PKK leader currently imprisoned in Turkey."^[15]

Policies and structure

The present leader of the organisation is Haji Ahmadi. According to the Washington Times, half the members of PJAK are women, many of them still in their teens, and one of the female members of the leadership council is Gulistan Dugan, a psychology graduate from the University of Tehran.^[16] This is due primarily to the fact that PJAK is strongly supportive of women's rights. PJAK believes that women must have a strong role in government and must be on an equal level with men in leadership positions.^[17]

PJAK is a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Confederation (KCK). A number of Kurdish groups and divisions fall under the KCK umbrella, which is led by an elected executive committee. The KCK is in charge of a number of decisions under the movement, and often, release press statements on behalf of its members. PJAK also has sub-divisions. PJAK's armed-wing has been named by the organization as the Eastern Kurdistan Forces (Hêzên Rojhilata Kurdistan or HRK). PJAK also has a women's branch, dedicated to serving women's interests within the group and women interests in general, called Yerjerika.^[18]

Like the present PKK goals in Turkey, PJAK leaders say their long-term goals are to establish an autonomous Kurdish region within the Iranian state.^[1] It is mainly focused on replacing Iran's theocracy with a democratic and federal government, where self-rule is granted to all ethnic minorities of Iran, including Arabs, Azeris, and Kurds.^[19]

Armed conflict and arrests

PJAK killed 24 members of Iranian security forces on the April 3, 2006, in retaliation for the killing of 10 Kurds demonstrating in Maku by Iranian security forces.^[16] On April 10, 2006, seven PJAK members were arrested in Iran, on suspicion that they had killed three Iranian security force personnel. Istanbul's Cihan News Agency claims that over 120 members of the Iranian security forces were killed by PJAK during 2005.^[20] PJAK set off a bomb on 8 May 2006 in Kermanshah, wounding five people at a government building.^[21]

As early as mid-2006, the Iranian security forces have confronted PJAK guerrillas in many different occasions along the border inside Iran. Since then, the US news channel MSNBC claims that the Iranian military has begun bombardments of Kurdish villages in US-occupied Iraq along the Iranian border while claiming that their primary targets have been PJAK militants. A number of civilians have died. ^[22] PJAK claims its guerrillas fight inside Iran, and in August 2007, managed to destroy an Iranian military helicopter that was conducting a forward operation of bombardment by Iranian forces.^[23]

On April 24, 2009, PJAK rebels attacked a police station in Kermanshah province. According to Iranian government sources, 18 policemen and eight rebels were killed in a fierce gun battle^[24]. Iran responded a week later by attacking Kurdish villages in the boder area of Panjwin inside Iraq using helicopter gunships. According to Iraqi border guards officials, the area attacked by Iran was not considered a stronghold of PJAK , that appeared to have been the target of the raid^[25].

Relation to United States government and military structures

PJAK is close to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).

Wikinews has related news: Kucinich asks Bush about alleged US support for armed insurgency in Iran

On April 18, 2006, US Congressman Dennis Kucinich sent a letter to US president George W. Bush in which he expressed his judgment that the US is likely to be supporting and coordinating PJAK, since PJAK operates and is based in Iraqi territory, which is under the control of the US-supported Kurdistan Regional Government.^[26]

In November 2006, journalist Seymour Hersh writing in The New Yorker, supported this claim, stating that the US military and the Israelis are giving the group equipment, training, and targeting information in order to create internal pressures in Iran.^[27]

This is denied officially by both the US and PJAK. In an interview with Slate magazine in June 2006, when PJAK spokesman Ihsan Warya was paraphrased as stating that he "nevertheless points out that PJAK really does wish it were an agent of the United States, and that [PJAK is] disappointed that Washington hasn't made contact." The Slate article continues stating that the PJAK wishes to be supported by and work with the United States in overthrowing the government of Iran in a similar way to the US eventually cooperated with Kurdish organisations in Iraq in overthrowing the government of Iraq during the most recent Iraq war.^[28]

In August 2007, the leader of PJAK visited Washington, DC in order to seek more open support from the US both politically and militarily^[29] but it was later said that he only made limited contacts with officials in Washington.^[22] One of the top officials in the PKK made a statement in late 2006, that "If the US is interested in PJAK, then it has to be interested in the PKK as well" referring to the alliance between the two groups and their memberships in the Kurdistan Democratic Confederation (KCK).^[30]

In one of the first actions of the Obama administration, PJAK was declared a terrorist organization, freezing any assets the PJAK has under U.S. jurisdiction and prohibiting American citizens from doing business with the organization.^[31]

See also

• Kurdistan Workers Party
• Abdullah Öcalan
• Kurdish people
• Iranian Kurdistan

References

External links

• PJAK website (in Persian, Sorani and English)
• Extract from article about Kurdish Iranian militants 28 June 2006