RRT ERBIL: PUK-PJAK CONFRONTATION IN SULAIMANIYAH

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 BAGHDAD 003148

SIPDIS

PLEASE PASS TO USAID

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/19/2017
TAGS: PREF PTER PBTS PGOV IZ IR TU
SUBJECT: RRT ERBIL: PUK-PJAK CONFRONTATION IN SULAIMANIYAH

Classified By: Classified By Regional Coordinator Jess Baily for reason
s 1.4 (b) and (d).

This is a Regional Reconstruction Team (RRT) Cable.


1. (C) SUMMARY: With approval of the Kurdistan Regional
Government (KRG),the Deputy Commander for Patriotic Union of
Kurdistan (PUK) Peshmerga said he recently deployed 200 PUK
Peshmerga soldiers to take military action against members of
the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan Party (PJAK) in the
Penjwin and Sangasar districts of Sulaimaniyah Province,
Iraqi Kurdistan. Iranian authorities had attacked PJAK
forces in Iraqi Kurdistan in retaliation for the deaths of
two Iranian soldiers. As a result of the border fighting
over the last four weeks, an estimated 500 Kurdish border
villagers fled their homes. Iraqi Kurdish military officials
said PJAK members are not allowed to leave their base in the
Qandil Mountain area. END SUMMARY

BACKGROUND


2. (C) IPAO met with General Mustapha Said Qadir, Deputy
Commander for PUK Peshmerga, and General Nabaz Ahmed
Abdullah, the Head of the Iraqi Ministry of Defense
Intelligence Service, Sulaimaniyah branch, on September 9 in
Sulaimaniyah. General Qadir recalled that in 1993, the
Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK a.k.a. KADEK, Kongra-Gel and
KCK) and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) ceased armed
conflict and agreed that the PKK would stay away from the
Badinan area of Dahuk Province near Turkey. In exchange,
Qadir continued, the PKK would settle in the Qandil Mountain,
Sharazur district. (Note: the Qandil Mountain straddles
Sulaimaniyah and Erbil Provinces and borders Iran). He
claimed the KRG, GOT, Government of Iraq (GOI),Government of
Syria, and the USG approved the arrangement.


2. (C) Qadir told IPAO that Qandil Mountain is now home to
3,000 PKK and PKK-affiliated Kurdish groups, including 1,000
PJAK or Partiya Jiyana Azada Kurdistana, who are Iranian
Kurds armed and funded by the PKK. The funding sources of
PKK, Qadir noted, include rich individual donors, business
deals and investment projects such as a satellite station and
foreign governments, e.g. Iraq, Syria, and Iran. If the PJAK
leaves the Qandil Mountain, Qadir continued, it receives an
unspecified warning as in the case last month when
approximately 150 of its members went to the Iranian-Iraqi
border area in Sulaimaniyah Province and 20 engaged with PUK
Peshmerga forces.

PJAK ATTACKS


3. (C) On August 16, shelling and attacks on border villages
started in the Penjwin and Sangaser districts of Sulaimaniyah
Province. General Nabaz said that Iranian authorities were
pursuing PKK and PJAK fighters. He noted that PJAK had
clashed with Iraqi border police and killed two Iranian
soldiers which prompted the Iranians to attack. On August
27-28, with KRG approval approximately 200 PUK Peshmergas of
the Sharazur and Penjwin districts were deployed to fight the
PJAK, Nabaz added. The PUK Peshmerga tried to negotiate with
the PJAK, he continued, before shooting started which
resulted in one injured Peshmerga; there were no causalities
and the PJAK left the area and have not returned.

THE TIMING OF PJAK ATTACKS


4. (C) August 2007 marked the first time villagers had to
leave because of fighting between the Iranian forces and
PJAK. (Note: the Iranians dropped flyers to warn villagers
in advance they were going to engage militarily with PJAK.
End Note). Nabaz said fighting between Iranians and the
approximately 150 PJAK members operating outside Qandil
rendered the border area unstable. He asserted PJAK wanted
also to weaken extremist Islamic parties in the area e.g.
Alsar al-Sunna, Alsar al-Islam. Both military leaders did
not believe an invasion into Iraqi Kurdistan by Iranian
troops is foreseeable. Qadir added the Iraqi military is
currently trying to draw the estimated 500 villagers back
home (Note: Press reports have stated that as many as 3,000
villagers were displaced.)


5. (C) Nabaz noted that PJAK also moved out of Qandil
because they believed Iran and Turkey would bomb them. The
PJAK forces felt confined and targeted, he added. Moreover,
the PJAK wanted to expand its area of operation and reduce
Iranian armed force levels, he said. Nabaz senses the recent
PJAK activity indicates the multilateral agreement to contain

BAGHDAD 00003148 002 OF 002


the PKK and PJAK in Qandil has weakened.


6. (C) Finally, according to Qadir and Nabaz, PJAK initiated
military action to send a signal to the Iraqis that Iran is a
force to be reckoned with in the region along side the United
States. (Note: KRG Minister of Interior, Karim Sinjari, said
on September 6 that Iran was "testing" both the KRG and the
US military response. End note.)

THE BALANCE OF POWER -- IRAN, U.S., TURKEY


7. (C) Qadir told IPAO that he believes the Iranian
authorities engage in border activity in Iraq to counter
alleged USG support to PJAK. He said the USG does this to
render Iran unstable. (Note: PJAK's leader is Germany-based
Rahman Haji Ahmadi who visited Washington, DC last July and
requested support from the USG but was refused.) To support
the USG strategy, the PUK and KDP collect information on
Iran, Qadir continued, through the KDP intelligence agency
(Parastin) led by Masour Barzani and the counterterrorism
group based in Sulaimaniyah headed by Bafel Talabani, sons of
the KRG President Massoud Barzani and Iraqi President Jalal
Talabani.


8. (C) Nabaz said that Iran and Turkey have an agreement
whereby Iran can obtain support from Turkey to attack the PKK
and PJAK. Iran and GOT also agreed, he continued, that if
the U.S. attacks Iran, Turkey will not back the U.S. Nabaz
added that Turkey sent 500 intelligence agents to the Iranian
military compound (referred to as Khana) to conduct training,
artillery exercises, and promote Turkish-Iranian cooperation.
GOT also recently gave the Iranian government surveillance
cameras with night vision for the border areas in exchange
for intelligence, he added. GOT is using Iran to weaken the
PKK, he continued, and keep its activities far from Turkey.
Qadir said in the next five years, the Turkish and U.S.
governments will change, but one thing is sure is that the
Turkish military does not really want to solve the PKK or
Kurdish problems. "The PKK is our disaster," he sighed.

SOLVING THE PKK ISSUE


9. (C) Qadir asserted the GOT needs to promote integration
and political rights for the Turkish Kurds in a non-violent
manner. The GOT should pass a resolution forgiving the PKK,
he suggested, and then the PKK must be disarmed. The PKK, he
continued, must alter their ideology from a focus on
establishing a greater Kurdistan to becoming a legitimate
part of the political process in Turkey through the normal
election process. The PKK needs to capitalize on the 22
Kurdish members of the GOT parliament to become a legitimate
political actor, Qadir stressed.


9. (C) COMMENT: Recent PJAK activity reveals a weakness in
the PKK containment strategy in the Qandil Mountain base.
Although an Iranian invasion is not presently foreseeable,
Iraqi Kurdish military leaders are concerned that more
resources are required to manage border security, which they
consider a GOI function. The frequency of shelling and
border attacks over the course of four weeks is unusual for
Sulaimaniyah Province. Iran probably intends to use the
threat of further border insecurity to influence KRG and USG
policy on the PJAK and other issues. End Comment.
BUTENIS