Assassination Attempt on an Iranian Political Activist in Erbil

Sohrab Rahmati, a political activist from Boukan and a member of the Bar Association of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, was the target of an assassination attempt on Thursday. According to Soran Khatri, a reporter for Voice of America from Erbil, Sohrab Rahmati was injured in the abdomen and is currently in a hospital in Erbil. Rahmati had recently told Voice of America that security agencies of the Islamic Republic had 'threatened him with assassination.' He is a lawyer and had taken on several cases related to assassinations linked to the Islamic Republic in the Kurdistan Region. Recently, he had taken on the case of the assassination of Behrouz Rahimi, a member of the Free Life Party of Kurdistan (PJAK), who was assassinated in Sulaymaniyah in July 2021. The main suspect in this case was sentenced to life imprisonment by a court in Sulaymaniyah last week. Voice of America has learned that the suspect confessed to having assassinated Behrouz Rahimi on behalf of the security agencies of the Islamic Republic in exchange for money. Concurrently with the nationwide protests in Iran in 2022, which erupted after the death of Mahsa (Zhina) Amini in the custody of the morality police, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps targeted the positions of these Kurdish parties in Iraq with artillery and missile attacks, claiming a connection between the protests in Iran and the Iranian Kurdish parties in Iraq, including PJAK. PJAK was listed in the U.S. Treasury Department's sanctions list in 2009. The U.S. considers the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization. Meanwhile, Kurdish parties have denied the accusations from the Islamic Republic. Arash Saleh, a representative of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, told the Persian section of Voice of America, 'The Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan has never used Iraqi territory for any military activity against the Islamic Republic.' He noted that Kurdish parties in Iraq have 'more of a political and non-military presence' and stated that the Iraqi government is responsible for protecting the lives of these political activists who are refugees in Iraq and their families. Salah Bayazidi, a representative of the Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan in the U.S., also previously told the Persian section of Voice of America, 'For years, missile attacks and the assassination of Iranian Kurdish civil and political activists have continued, and now, a year after the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution, the Islamic Republic is once again afraid of public uprising in Iran.'