THE KURDISH BACK DOOR

“The name of the game is taking care of yourself, because you're going to live long enough to wish you had.”

~ Grace Mirabella.

There's a pretty good article at Macleans giving a breakdown of some of the ethnic-based organizations in and around Iran who would like to see the mullahs take a hard fall. The gist of the article is that the US is covertly talking to these groups in order to instigate regime change.

Of those ethnic-based groups posing a threat to the evil Teheran regime, who are the baddest? The Kurds, naturally. Who tops the list as the baddest of the bad? The PKK. The CIA seem very interested in our bad boys and girls:

For the moment, it's the Kurdish groups, with their camps lined up along the Iranian border in Iraq, that pose the greatest threat to Iran. That's a fact the U.S. hasn't missed. The militant Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has been fighting a bloody insurgency against Turkey since the mid-1980s in the hopes of establishing a Kurdish homeland, has been using the slopes of Qandil mountain, approximately 130 km north of Sulaymaniyah, as a home base from which to launch attacks against both Turkey and Iran. The PKK is a threat to the region's territorial integrity, as it hopes to carve a Kurdish homeland out of sections of Iran, Turkey and Iraq. And the PKK has apparently been recruited by the U.S.

Rustam Joudy, one of the group's senior leaders, initially denied that. "We have nothing to do with the Americans," he said. But locals living alongside the PKK contradicted him. "The Americans were coming here regularly six months ago," said one villager. "We don't know why. The PKK leadership never talked to us about it." When confronted with such allegations, the PKK leadership drastically modified its earlier comments, admitting that they not only met U.S. representatives in the past, but that these meetings continue. "They have stopped in Qandil," a spokesman told Maclean's, "but these meetings continue in other places. As for their purpose, that's strategic. I cannot tell you why."

After repeated requests for a comment, the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad issued a terse denial: "The report that U.S. government officials are meeting with PKK representatives is false." But the mere fact that the PKK and others continue to operate in Iraq shows they are of use to the U.S., says a former PKK member who would identify himself only as Raoof. "The Kurdish revolutionaries are a threat to Iraqi Kurdistan's stability as well," he says. "And yet, they are still here. If the Americans didn't have a use for these groups, they would not let them remain in Iraq."

I see the CIA uses PKK "confessors," too. Did they learn that from the Turks or teach it to the Turks?

It's no secret that the CIA was making regular trips to Qandîl in 2003 and early 2004. Several articles appeared in Western media as testimony to that, at the time. A short time after the stream of trips and articles ended, PWD appeared on the scene. Come to think of it, there was a CIA "expert" on hand to take a look at the car in which Kani Yilmaz and Sabri Tori died.

The KRG is trying to take a hands-off approach to any business the CIA might have with the PKK over regime change in Iran, but believes that US State Department involvement with a group they consider to be "terrorist" is acceptable.

On the other hand, there have been a number of articles recently on PJAK, which is also a member of KONGRA-GEL. PJAK therefore falls under the umbrella of Koma Komalên Kurdistan which, in turn, is headed by Murat Karayilan. In short, and for those who don't understand the hierarchy, PJAK is a member of "PKK." According to one of those articles, the Americans have not been in contact with them:

Unlike most other rebel groups in the Middle East, PEJAK is secular and Western-oriented. When the group's members talk, their Kurdish is peppered with such Western words as "freedom," "human rights" and "ecology."

Iran has denounced it as a terrorist group and accused the United States of funding it. But at PEJAK's camp, there is no obvious evidence of American equipment or money. The only weapons on show are AK-47 assault rifles and grenades, and the funding is clearly limited.

Each recruit has a single pair of khaki fatigues, and even its leaders subsist on simple meals of bread, cheese and fresh vegetables at communal outdoor tables.

The group's leaders say that they have had no contact with the United States, but that they would be willing to work with Europe or America against the Tehran government.

"We demand democratic change in Iran," Mr. Zagros said. "And if the U.S. government wants to help us, we are happy to accept their support.

"The U.S. talks about bringing democracy to the region," he added. "But for 200 years, the Kurds have struggled against dictatorship and oppression and in defense of our human rights. And so far the West has not helped us. Why?"

Why? That's the big question, isn't it?

Another article of interest on PJAK can be found at Mother Jones. Another one, from last year, can be found at Caucaz.

Is the CIA really talking to PKK? Are they really trying to use the back door to take down the evil Teheran regime? Who really knows? Only one thing is important: Any deals cut with the Americans (and anyone else, for that matter) must be cut, first and foremost, with Kurdish interests at heart.

Other interests are unacceptable.