PKK Arming Again in Iran
The Kurdish movement is already declaring that it will again have an armed presence in Iran, complicating Turkey’s peace initiative, writes Kadri Gursel.
The Party for Free Life in Kurdistan (PJAK) is identified as the Iranian branch of the Turkish-origin Kurdish Movement Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). The PJAK began its armed activities in 2004 in the Kurdish-populated regions of Iran and kept them up for seven years until August 2011.
Now there are interesting signs that the PKK could re-establish its armed presence in Iran’s Kurdistan region parallel to progress in the peace process between the Turkish government and mainstream PKK.
At the moment, PKK is unarmed in Iran. In Turkey, it is at phase of withdrawing its armed forces. In the near future, we may see an unarmed PKK in Turkey, but a newly armed one in Iran.
This likelihood that must be taken seriously was outlined in the Radikal articles of April 10-11 by Aysel Tugluk, an independent member of parliament from Van and co-chair of “Democratic Society Congress,” a superstructure of Kurdish organizations. Tugluk, one of the leading figures of the Kurdish political movement, had this to say on the political and historical significance of the peace process for the country and the region in her article titled “Road of no return:”
