The Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK is a Kurdish militant political organization and armed guerrilla movement which historically operated throughout Kurdistan but is now primarily based in the mountainous Kurdish-majority regions of southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq. Since 1984, the PKK has utilized asymmetric warfare in the Kurdish–Turkish conflict. Although the PKK initially sought an independent Kurdish state, in the 1990s its goals changed to seeking autonomy and increased political and cultural rights for Kurds within Turkey.
The history of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) began in 1974 as a Marxist–Leninist organization under the leadership of Abdullah Öcalan. In 1978 the organization adopted the name "Kurdistan Workers Party" and waged its low-level Urban War in Turkish Kurdistan between 1978 and 1980. The PKK restructured itself and moved the organization structure to Syria between 1980 and 1984, after the 1980 Turkish coup d'état. The Kurdish-Turkish conflict began in earnest in 1984. The rural-based insurgency lasted between 1984 and 1992. The PKK shifted its activities to include urban attacks against Turkish military bases between 1993–1995 and later 1996–1999. Öcalan was captured in Kenya in early 1999. After a "self declared peace initiative of 1999", hostilities resumed in February 2004. 2013 saw another ceasefire, but the conflict resumed again in 2015 and has continued since.
The Kurdistan Free Life Party, or PJAK, is a Kurdish leftist anti-Islamic Republic of Iran armed militant group. It has waged an intermittent armed struggle since 2004 against the Iranian regime, seeking self-determination through some degree of autonomy for Kurds in Iran.
Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou was an Iranian Kurdish politician and leader. Ghassemlou was the Secretary-General of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (KDPI) from 1971 until his assassination in 1989 by individuals suspected of being agents of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The Iraqi Kurdish Civil War was a civil war that took place between rival Kurdish factions in Iraqi Kurdistan during the mid-1990s, mostly between the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and the Kurdistan Democratic Party. Over the course of the conflict, Kurdish factions from Iran and Turkey, as well as Iranian, Iraqi and Turkish forces, were drawn into the fighting, with additional involvement from American forces. Between 35,000 and 40,000 fighters and civilians were killed.
The Iran–PJAK conflict is an armed conflict between the Islamic Republic of Iran and Kurdish rebels of the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK), which began in 2004. The group has carried out numerous attacks in the Kurdistan Province of Iran and provinces of Western Iran. PJAK is closely affiliated with the militant Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), the primary opponent of the Republic of Turkey in the Kurdish–Turkish conflict. PJAK has been designated as a terrorist organization by Iran, Japan, Turkey, and the United States.
This is the timeline of the Turkish-Kurdish conflict. The Kurdish insurgency is an armed conflict between the Republic of Turkey and various Kurdish insurgent groups, which have demanded separation from Turkey to create an independent Kurdistan, or to have autonomy and greater political and cultural rights for Kurds in Turkey. The main rebel group is the Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK, which was founded on November 27, 1978, and started a full-scale insurgency on August 15, 1984, when it declared a Kurdish uprising. Apart from some extended ceasefires, the conflict has continued to the present day.
The Iraqi–Kurdish conflict consists of a series of wars and rebellions by the Kurds against the central authority of Iraq during the 20th century, which began shortly after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I and lasting until the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. Some put the marking point of the conflict beginning to the attempt by Mahmud Barzanji to establish an independent Kingdom of Kurdistan, while others relate to the conflict as only the post-1961 insurrection by the Barzanis. The conflict lasted until the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, though tensions between the Kurdish autonomy and the central Iraqi government have continued.
2011 Iran–Iraq cross-border raids were a series of operations, performed by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), against the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK), a Kurdish rebel group. The operations began in July 2011, and have included attacks on PJAK bases in Iranian territory, penetration into Iraqi Kurdistan territory, bombing of PJAK associated bases and villages in Kurdish controlled Iraqi areas and direct targeting of Kurdish guerrilla command in Qandil mountains. The clashes resulted in dozens killed and wounded on both sides, with hundreds of displaced Kurdish villagers. The exact numbers of casualties on each side are a matter of controversy.
2007 West Azerbaijan clashes were a series of armed clashes between Iranian security forces and the Kurdish insurgent group PJAK in Iran's West Azerbaijan province. It started with a series of clashes between Iran and the PKK, leading to the death of 17 PKK militants between February 22 and February 24 by Iranian forces. This was followed by an Iranian helicopter crash in Khoy, an incident which was claimed to be performed by PJAK, though denied by Iranians as technical malfunction. The Iranian military launched an offensive the next day which resulted in the death of 47 insurgents and 17 security forces and lasted until March 1.
Kurdish separatism in Iran or the Kurdish–Iranian conflict is an ongoing, long-running, separatist dispute between the Kurdish opposition in Western Iran and the governments of Iran, lasting since the emergence of Reza Shah Pahlavi in 1918.
The 1979 Kurdish rebellion in Iran was one of the largest nationwide uprisings in the country against the new state following the Iranian Revolution. The Kurdish rebellion began in mid-March, just two months after the Revolution ended, and was one of the most intense Kurdish rebellions in modern Iran.
The 1967 Kurdish revolt in Iran erupted in March 1967, as part of the long-running Iranian-Kurdish conflict. Abrahamian describes the revolt as a Marxist insurgency with the aim of establishing autonomy for Kurds in Iran, modeled as a federal republic. The revolt, consolidating several tribal uprisings which had begun in 1966, was inspired by the First Iraqi–Kurdish War in neighboring Iraq and enjoyed the support of the recovering Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran, previously crushed during the 1946 Iran crisis. The 1967 revolt, coordinated into a semi-organized campaign in the Mahabad-Urumiya region by the revived KDPI party, was entirely subdued by the central Iranian government.
On 7 May 2015, ethnic Kurds rioted in Mahabad, Iran, following the unexplained death on 4 May 2015 of Farinaz Khosravani, a 25-year-old Kurdish hotel chambermaid. Khosravani fell to her death from a fourth-floor window of the Tara, the hotel where she worked. Anger mounted following reports that Khosravani died attempting to escape an Iranian Revolutionary Guard official who allegedly raped her. The rioters reportedly set fire to the hotel. At least 25 people were wounded in the riot.
In late July 2015, the third phase of the Kurdish–Turkish conflict between various Kurdish insurgent groups and the Turkish government erupted, following a failed two and a half year-long peace process aimed at resolving the long-running conflict.
2016–present clashes in West Iran refers to the ongoing military clashes between Kurdish insurgent party Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI) and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, which began in April 2016. Kurdistan Freedom Party (PAK) and Komalah expressed their support to the Kurdish cause of PDKI as well, with both clashing with Iranian security forces in 2016 and 2017 respectively. In parallel, a leftist Iranian Kurdish rebel group PJAK resumed military activities against Iran in 2016, following a long period of stalemate.
Terrorism in Turkey is a significant issue for Turkish authorities as 1.6 million people were investigated after being accused of terrorism between 2016 and 2020. Prominent figures of the Turkish opposition were accused of an alleged membership of a terrorist group. The definition of terrorism in Turkey is rather vague as it also includes a social media post or taking part in popular protests. Terrorist attacks in Turkey have occurred in the southeastern and eastern provinces, and major cities like Ankara and Istanbul. The group Dev-Genç was founded in 1969 and involved in a string of kidnappings, bombings and bank robberies until martial law was declared in 1971. While these incidents were halted by 1973, attacks by the Armenian groups Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA) and Justice Commandos of the Armenian Genocide (JCAG) continued. Most of these attacks took place internationally, though there were some attacks within Turkey as well. For example, the May 1977 bombing of the Istanbul airport and the Ankara Esenboğa Airport attack. In Turkey protesting for Kurdish rights or supporting or demanding education in the Kurdish language is often also seen as supporting terrorism of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
Suleiman Moini was an Iranian Kurdish political activist. After the collapse of the 1946 republic, the political activities of the Kurds in Iran declined. Some of the 1946 political activists to went to Iraqi Kurdistan and later joined the rebellion of Mustafa Barzani in the 1960s.
The Kurdish–Turkish conflict is an armed conflict between the Republic of Turkey and various Kurdish insurgent groups who have either demanded separation from Turkey to create an independent Kurdistan, or attempted to secure autonomy and greater political and cultural rights for Kurds inside the Republic of Turkey.
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