Iranian government says widespread protests are a ‘political plot’ by Kurdish separatists
Facing a serious challenge from ongoing widespread unrest, Iran’s government is blaming Kurdish separatists for inciting the unrest, an Iranian academic has said.
Protests demanding the overthrow of Iran’s clerical rulers are now in their fourth month, having erupted after the death of Mahsa Amini while in custody of the morality police.
Iran’s attorney general has said the force, which had enforced Iran’s dress code, has since been disbanded.
Ms Amini, who is of Kurdish-Iranian descent, is being held up as a symbol and rallying cry, while the regime’s brutal crackdown has lead to the deaths of more than 470 protesters, according to the activist HRANA news agency.
Grappling with perhaps the greatest threat to its rule in decades, the government has accused foreign nations of inciting the demonstrations.
The regime has also levelled blame at its Kurdish population – much of which is concentrated near the border of Iraq.
A hardline Iranian security official told Reuters: “The Kurdish opposition groups are using Amini’s case as an excuse to reach their decades-long goal of separating Kurdistan from Iran, but they will not succeed.”
Meanwhile, Iranian state media have called the nationwide protests a “political plot” ignited by Kurdish separatist groups, particularly the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran.
Ms Amini was from the Kurdish city of Saqqez, the first area to witness protests after her death in September.
“For the government it’s useful to say this is Kurdish separatists,” Iranian academic Yassamine Mather says.
She told Sky News: “But the demonstrations I’ve seen online, the slogans that I read don’t point to that.
“On the contrary they seem to emphasise their part in a larger Iran, like they call on people in Baluchestan, in Tehran, in Azerbaijan to support them.
“If you wanted separation, you wouldn’t do that.”
“The protesters see themselves as part of a much bigger Iran protest,” the Oxford University scholar added.
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Will Iran lift its headscarf ban?
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‘The whole of Iran rose up’
Samira, 42, is a mother of two teenage boys and lives in Sanandaj city, the regional capital of the Kurdistan region in northwestern Iran.
She told Sky News that her Kurdish roots and being Sunni Muslim means her people have been under oppression for decades.
She added: “We as Kurds want our human rights and have no interest in separating Kurdistan from Iran – in contrast to what the government is promoting.
“It is natural the more they violate our rights, voices for federalism and separation grow.
“But the fact that a Kurdish girl was killed, but the whole of Iran rose up, shows that we as Iranians from any background or tribes are not separate, and we support each other,” she said.
Protesters in Tehran in September
Dr Arshin Adib-Moghaddam, a professor at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, said the protests are “certainly not primarily sectarian” and involve “every strata of Iranian society”.
He told Sky News: “At the core of Iran, there is an ancient culture, a common historical memory, rites and rituals that are clearly shared.
“Conversely, the Iranian state attempts to rally a weary population around an ideology that denies that ingrained diversity.”
Dr Adib-Moghaddam, author of What Is Iran?, added: “The Iranian state is prudent enough not to sectarianise this conflict and probably realistic enough to understand, that the protests address the recent unwillingness of Iran to reform, and therefore also the idea of the Islamic Republic itself.”
The Iranian government has also accused Kurdish opposition groups based across the border in northern Iraq of inciting the demonstrations and smuggling weapons into the country.
The authorities have not provided evidence for these claims, which Kurdish groups have denied.
Nonetheless, a senior Iranian military official visiting Baghdad last month threatened Iraq with a ground military operation if the Iraqi army does not fortify the countries’ shared border against Kurdish opposition groups.
“We’re being used as a scapegoat,” Khelil Nadri, a spokesman for the Kurdistan Freedom party (PAK) told the Financial Times.
World
‘Almost like a game of target practice’: British surgeon says IDF shooting Gazans at aid points
A British surgeon who recently returned from Gaza has told Sky News that there is “profound malnutrition” among the population – and claims IDF soldiers are shooting civilians at aid points “like a game of target practice”.
Dr Nick Maynard spent four weeks working inside Nasser Hospital, where a lack of food has left medics struggling to treat children and toddlers.
The conditions inside the hospital, in the south of the Strip, have been documented in a Sky News report.
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Malnourished girl: ‘The war changed me’
Dr Maynard told The World with Yalda Hakim: “I met several doctors who had cartons of formula feed in their luggage – and they were all confiscated by the Israeli border guards. Nothing else got confiscated, just the formula feed.
“There were four premature babies who died during the first two weeks when I was in Nasser Hospital – and there will be many, many more deaths until the Israelis allow proper food to get in there.”
Palestinians wait to receive food from a charity kitchen in Gaza City. Pic: Reuters
In other developments:
• Israel and the US have recalled their teams from Gaza ceasefire talks
• US envoy Steve Witkoff has accused Hamas “of failing to act in good faith”
• France has announced that it will recognise the state of Palestine
• An influential group of MPs is calling on the UK to “immediately” do the same
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‘Starvation used as a weapon’
‘They were shells’
Dr Nick Maynard has been going to Gaza for the past 15 years – and this is his third visit to the territory since the war began.
The British surgeon added that virtually all of the kids in the paediatric unit of Nasser Hospital are being fed with sugar water.
“They’ve got a small amount of formula feed for very small babies, but not enough,” he warned.
Dr Maynard said the lack of aid has also had a huge impact on his colleagues.
“I saw people I’d known for years and I didn’t recognise some of them,” he added. “Two colleagues had lost 20kg and 30kg respectively. They were shells, they’re all hungry.
“They’re going to work every day, then going home to their tents where they have no food.”
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Ex-Gaza aid worker claims personnel shot at Palestinians
IDF ‘shooting Gazans at aid points’
Elsewhere in the interview, Dr Maynard claimed Israeli soldiers are shooting civilians at aid points “almost like a game of target practice”.
He has operated on boys as young as 11 who had been “shot at food distribution points” run by the US and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
“They had gone to get food for their starving families and they were shot,” he said.
“I operated on one 12-year-old boy who died on the operating table because his injuries were so severe.”
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Gaza deaths increase when aid sites open
Dr Maynard continued: “What was even more distressing was the pattern of injuries that we saw, the clustering of injuries to particular body parts on certain days.
“One day they’d be coming in predominately with gunshot wounds to the head or the neck, another day to the abdomen.
“Twelve days ago, four young teenage boys came in, all of whom had been shot in the testicles and deliberately so.
“The clustering was far too obvious to be accidental, and it seemed to us like this was almost like a game of target practice.
“I would never have believed this possible unless I’d witnessed this with my own eyes.”
Palestinians brought to Nasser Hospital after being shot by Israeli forces, according to hospital officials and eyewitnesses. Pic: AP
Sky News has contacted the Israeli Defence Forces for comment.
An IDF spokesperson previously told Sky News it “strongly rejected” the accusations that its forces were instructed to deliberately shoot at civilians.
“To be clear, IDF directives prohibit deliberate attacks on civilians,” the spokesperson said, adding that the incidents are “being examined by the relevant IDF authorities”.
Read more:
Medics at Nasser hospital struggle to feed children
Gaza food situation ‘worst its ever been’
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Israeli military show aid waiting inside Gaza
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has been managing the supply of aid to Gaza since Israel lifted an 11-week blockade in May.
It has four aid distribution sites, all of which are located in Israeli military zones, with journalists prohibited from entering.
More than 1,000 people have been reported killed while trying to receive food aid since the GHF took over, according to the UN.
UNRWA, its relief agency for Gaza, has heavily criticised the scheme.
Commissioner general Philippe Lazzarini said: “The so-called ‘GHF’ distribution scheme is a sadistic death trap. Snipers open fire randomly on crowds as if they are given a licence to kill.”
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Just a fraction of the aid trucks needed are making it into the enclave, the UN has said, while multiple aid groups and the World Health Organisation have warned Gazans are facing “mass starvation”.
Mr Lazzarini quoted a colleague on Thursday and said malnourished Palestinians in the Gaza “are neither dead nor alive, they are walking corpses”.
Eleven Thai civilians and a soldier have been killed in clashes between Thailand and Cambodia, officials have said, as long-standing tensions in disputed border areas boiled over into open conflict.
Among those killed was an eight-year-old boy, the army said in a statement.
It said most casualties occurred in Si Sa Ket province, where six people were killed after shots were fired at a fuel station.
Smoke and fire in the Kantharalak district in Thailand amid clashes between Thailand and Cambodia. Pic: Army Region 2 via Facebook/Reuters
Another 14 people have been injured in three Thai border provinces.
Thailand’s health minister Somsak Thepsuthin confirmed the fatalities to reporters, adding Cambodia’s actions, including an attack on a hospital, should be considered war crimes.
Both countries accuse one another of starting the military clashes and have downgraded their diplomatic relations in the rapidly escalating dispute. Thailand has also sealed all land border crossings with Cambodia.
Early on Thursday, a Thai F-16 fighter jet bombed targets in Cambodia, according to Thailand’s army.
“We have used air power against military targets as planned,” Thai army deputy spokesperson Richa Suksuwanon said.
Cambodia’s defence ministry said Thai jets had dropped bombs on a road near the ancient Preah Vihear temple, saying it “strongly condemns the reckless and brutal military aggression of the Kingdom of Thailand against the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Cambodia”.
What has caused Thailand-Cambodia border clashes?
Thai people who fled clashes take shelter in Surin province. Pic: AP
Fighting has taken place in disputed border areas
‘Civilian areas targeted’
Clashes are ongoing in at least six areas along the border, the Thai defence ministry said.
Thailand’s foreign ministry said Cambodian troops fired “heavy artillery” on a Thai military base on Thursday morning and also targeted civilian areas, including a hospital.
“The Royal Thai Government is prepared to intensify our self-defence measures if Cambodia persists in its armed attack and violations upon Thailand’s sovereignty,” the ministry said in a statement.
A livestream video from Thailand’s side showed people, including children and the elderly, running from their homes and hiding in a concrete bunker as explosions sounded.
The clash happened in an area where the ancient Prasat Ta Muen Thom temple stands along the border between Thailand’s Surin province and Cambodia’s Oddar Meanchey province.
Thai people who fled clashes in Surin province, northeastern Thailand. Pic: AP
‘Conflict not spreading’
Thailand’s acting premier said fighting must first stop before peace talks can start.
Caretaker Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai told reporters there had been no declaration of war and conflict was not spreading into more provinces.
He said Cambodia had fired heavy weapons into Thailand without any specific targets, resulting in civilian deaths.
Earlier on Thursday, Cambodia downgraded diplomatic relations with Thailand to their lowest level, expelled the Thai ambassador and recalled all Cambodian staff from its embassy in Bangkok.
The day before, its neighbour withdrew its ambassador and expelled the top Cambodian diplomat in protest after five Thai soldiers were wounded in a land mine blast, one of whom lost part of a leg.
A week earlier, a land mine in a different contested area exploded and wounded three Thai soldiers, including one who lost a foot.
Relations between the southeast Asian neighbours have collapsed after a Cambodian soldier was killed in an armed confrontation in a disputed border area in May.
Read more on Sky News:
UK’s ‘tough choices’
‘Man-made starvation’ in Gaza
Man ‘scarred’ by Trump max security prison
Nationalist passions on both sides have further inflamed the situation, and Thailand’s prime minister was suspended earlier this month as an investigation was opened into possible ethics violations over her handling of the border dispute.
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Border disputes are longstanding issues that have caused periodic tensions between the countries. The most prominent and violent conflicts have been around the 1,000-year-old Preah Vihear temple.
In 1962, the International Court of Justice recognised Cambodian sovereignty over the temple area.
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