PDKI claims to have killed 10 Iranian soldiers

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan24) – The Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI) claimed on Saturday to have killed at least 10 soldiers of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) last week.

A statement released on the PDKI website said clashes between Kurdish forces and IRGC soldiers erupted on the evening of Sep. 18, in the Mukrian region of Iranian Kurdistan (Rojhilat).

Mukrian is a Kurdish name for the southern areas of the West Azerbaijan Province.

According to the statement, the clashes between Kurdish fighters and Iranian soldiers took place in the villages of Qabrihussein and Pirdanan until the following morning.

The PDKI said among the 10 Iranian soldiers killed two were commanders.

“Unfortunately, Rahim Abdullahnejad, a brave Peshmerga who was severely injured during the clashes, lost his life today,” read the statement. “The Peshmerga forces buried Abdullahnejad in Eastern Kurdistan.”

Founded in 1945 by the iconic Kurdish leader and President of the short-lived Kurdistan Republic Qazi Muhammad, PDKI, a secular and social democratic party, has for decades been fighting for Kurdish autonomy and rights in Iran.

The PDKI reignited a conflict with the Islamic Republic of Iran in June this year, 20 years after their silencing of weapons in 1996 for the sake of not jeopardizing Kurdish gains in Iraq.

The fighting in the last three months had seen dozens of Kurdish Peshmerga fighters and Iranian soldiers killed in rural and mountainous areas of Rojhilat.

In response, Iran has repeatedly shelled border areas in the Kurdistan Region where PDKI has bases, causing displacement and panic among the local civilian population.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany