Iran claims to have killed six members of PKK offshoot

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Iranian forces claim they have killed six and hospitalized several others in clashes with an Iranian Kurdish (Rojhilati) militia group near the country’s border with the Kurdistan Region.

The incident took place Friday afternoon at the Hamzeh Seyed al-Shohada base near the Kurdish county of Kamyaran in Rojhilat’s Kurdistan Province.

A team from the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK) “fell into an ambush … and were destroyed” by a detachment of the Ground Forces of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ (IRGC), read a statement by IRGC command, according to Tasnim news agency.

It continued, “during the clash, six … members [of PJAK] were killed and a number of them were injured and hospitalized.”

PJAK has yet to respond to Iran’s statement.

The IRGC said that the fighters were part of the group of militants who in late July attacked and killed at least 10 Iranian border guards in a nighttime operation in the mountainous terrain near the Kurdistan Region.

Although the area has been witnessing a spike in attacks by Kurdish opposition fighters, the July offensive saw the largest number of Iranian troops killed in a single action along the border in recent years.

PJAK, founded in 2004 as an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), has waged an intermittent armed struggle against the Iranian government for Kurdish rights in Rojhilat. It is most commonly described as the military wing of the PKK in Iran.

Editing by John J Catherine

*A previous version of this report mistakenly stated the attack had taken place at the Hamzeh Seyed al-Shohada base. This was inaccurate. The statement on the attack was released by the Hamzeh Seyed al-Shohada base.