ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A one-way attack drone struck a base belonging to the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI) in Erbil province early Tuesday, a senior official told Rudaw, marking the second consecutive day of strikes against Iranian Kurdish opposition groups in the Kurdistan Region.
A KDPI official told Rudaw English on condition of anonymity that a drone struck the mountainous Balisan area early Tuesday morning, south of Rawanduz within the Soran administration northeast of the Kurdistan Region capital, with no casualties reported.
Another informed official in the Soran Independent Administration confirmed to Rudaw’s Soran Hussein on Tuesday that "The attack took place at 3:30 am today, targeting a KDPI base. Aside from material damage, there were no casualties."
The attack comes a day after three missiles early Monday struck a camp housing families of the Iranian Kurdish dissident group Komala in Zirgwez, Sulaimani province, causing material damage but no casualties, according to Ali Ranjbari, the head of Komala’s public relations.
Iran has repeatedly launched missiles and drones following the US-Iran war, which erupted in late February, in addition to its decades-long confrontation with Kurdish opposition groups operating inside the country as well as bases in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region whom it accuses of posing a security threat, demanding that Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) disarm or expel them.
Iran in mid-August targeted Komala and KDPI bases near Soran, as well as in mid-July, the latter of which resulted in the deaths of nine Komala members in an Iranian missile strike on the group’s headquarters in Zirgwez.
Ranjbari attributed the Monday bombardment to the use of intimidation tactics stemming from the Iranian government's “anxiety, fear, and panic” over a planned general strike across Iranian Kurdistan (Rojhelat).
A coalition of six Kurdish opposition parties that includes the KDPI and Komala on Sunday called for “all segments and strata of the nation to carry out a nationwide strike” and protests throughout Iran on Wednesday, September 16, to mark the fourth anniversary of the death of Zhina (Mahsa) Amini, a Kurdish woman who died while in custody over alleged violations of the country’s mandatory hijab rules.
The attacks follow a series of clashes, including a recent incident in early September in which an Iranian border guard was killed by an unidentified opposition group near Paveh, a predominantly Kurdish city in western Iran close to the border with the Kurdistan Region.
Iranian strikes have also hit areas beyond the bases of Kurdish opposition groups. Rudaw has recorded nearly 1,000 drone and missile attacks on the Kurdistan Region since the start of the US-Iran conflict in late February, killing 32 people and wounding 154 others as of early August.
The Kurdistan Regional Government has repeatedly maintained that the Region is not a party to the conflict and has called for an end to attacks on its territory.
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