Iranian jets 'hit' Iraqi Kurd areas

[shravan]

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2009/05/200952122842742602.html

Iranian jets 'hit' Iraqi Kurd areas

Iranian helicopters have attacked three Kurdish villages in northern Iraq in an apparent cross-border raid targeting Kurdish separatists, according to an Iraqi Kurdish border guard official.

There were no immediate reports of casualties after the pre-dawn raid along the Iraqi border province of Sulaymaniya on Saturday.

"At 4 am (0100 GMT) they attacked with artillery the villages of Kani Saif, Jomarasi and Kara Sozi, that belong to the Panjwin district," the border guard official told the AFP news agency.

"After the (initial) attacks, three Iranian helicopters attacked these areas again.

"This is the first time they have used helicopters."

The website of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party, quoting witnesses, corroborated the report, adding that the aircraft flew at very low altitude over the villages.

The border guard official said the area was not considered a stronghold of the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK), an Iranian Kurdish separatist group that appeared to have been the target of the raid.

There was no immediate comment from Iran.

The air raid, if confirmed, would be the first by the Iranian air force on the region.

Deadly clash

The incident comes a week after reports of a clash between Iranian police officers and suspected PJAK fighters in the country's western province of Kermanshah.

At least 10 policemen and 10 fighters were killed in the gun battle.

Kermanshah borders Iraq and is home to many of Iran's minority Kurds.

Iran's western provinces have been the scene of regular armed clashes between Iranian security forces and Kurdish separatists including PJAK, a group linked to Turkey's outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

The PKK took up arms in 1984 to fight for a Kurdish homeland in southeast Turkey and is recognised by much of the international community as a terrorist group.

Some Iranian analysts said that PJAK fighters had bases in northeastern Iraq from where they operated against Turkey, Iran, and Syria.

[shravan]

Iran’s Kurdish community
An estimated 12 million Kurds live in Iran, between 15-17 per cent of the population. They live mainly in the provinces of West Azerbaijan, Kordestan, Kermanshah and Ilam in the west and south-west of the country, although many have moved to the big cities such as Tehran. Sanandaj is the administrative centre of Kordestan. There is also a community of Kurds in North Khorasan province in north-eastern Iran.

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Iran’s Kurds, most of whom are Sunni Muslims, face discrimination because of their religion, even though Sunni Islam is recognized and accorded formal legal standing in Iran. The religious institutions of Sunni Kurds are generally blocked, while those of Shi’as are encouraged and supported by the state. There is not a single Sunni mosque in Tehran and, according to reports; the government has restricted the expansion of Sunni mosques that exist elsewhere in the country.

[CLL1709]

Doesn't this action constitute an act of war?

[Mediocrates]

There are laws in that part of the world? I had not heard.

[shravan]

Doesn't this action constitute an act of war?

Seems like Iran is checking White House response.

[Mediocrates]

Except that it would open the US to charges that their UAVs buzzing around Pakistan are also an act of war. You know, one of the advantages, maybe the only one, of suggesting we live in a post national age is that there are no longer meaningful enforceable national boundaries.

[shravan]

Except that it would open the US to charges that their UAVs buzzing around Pakistan are also an act of war.

U.S. Predator UAVs are parked inside a Pakistani air base....;)


You know, one of the advantages, maybe the only one, of suggesting we live in a post national age is that there are no longer meaningful enforceable national boundaries.

I don't agree on that.