Kurdish guerrillas dig in to face Iran Govt thrust

Press, 28 August 1979, Page 8

Kurdish guerrillas dig in to face Iran Govt thrust

NZPA-Reuter Mahabad Kurdish guerrillas yesterday were dug in along mountain passes ready to face an expected attack by Iranian Army units striving to capture the rebel capital of Mahabad in north-west Iran.

The insurgents said they had thousands of min prepared to battle Government forces with tanks, heavy artillery and anti-tank weapons captured from the Shah’s army six months ago. According to the Kurdish military headquarters- in Mahabad, the insurgents pushed back an initial army thrust from the north on Sunday, putting four Government tanks and one truck out of action. There was no report on Sunday’s fighting from the Government side. Since the Kurdish conflict flared up a week ago the Iranian military has given only sketchy information about their drive to subdue the western border region. Government forces were grouped yesterday at the village of Solduz, 35km away from Mahabad, ready to drive against the rebel stronghold. One of the Government Army’s big successes was the capture of the Kurdish stronghold of the Saqqez at the week-end after four days of intense fighting. The official P.A.R.S. news agency said 15,000 “evil” books had been burnt ip Saqqez after Islamic Revolutionary Guard members and troops entered the town and relieved the besieged garrison. Iran’s strictly-controlled press reported that the streets of Saqqez were virtually deserted. Photographs published by the Teheran afternoon newspapers showed bare-chested guards celebrating their victory beside tanks in the streets of Saqqez. P.A.R.S. also reported that the roving religious, 1 judge'sent to deal with the.

Kurdish insurgents had issued an ultimatum to the rebels to put down their arms and return to their homes. At least 45 people have been executed in the Kurdish region since Ayatollah Sadegh Khalkhali, described by P.A.R.S. as the head of Iran’s revolutionary tribunals, arrived on his special mission last week. One of the main problems facing the rebels is shortage of supplies, particularly petrol. Sources said food, medicine, and petrol were running out in all the guerrillaheld towns. Baneh had only three to four days supplies of petrol left, and there was none in Sardasht. In Baneh, the Kurds’ spiritual leader, Sheikh Ezzeddin Hosseini, launched appeals to the United Nations and the non-aligned countries to put pressure on the Teheran authorities. “I call on the United Nations and other freedomloving peoples of the world to condemn the killing and the mass executions of Kurds and to come to the rescue of the Kurds,” he said in a message to the United Nations.

I Kurdish sources in Tehe- : ran said six Islamic Revolu- ■ tionary Guards held hostage • by the insurgents had been executed in retaliation for ! the recent executions of ■ Kurdish prisoners by the Government. The Revolutionary Guards ’ were condemned to death by Kurdish revolutionary tribunals, according to the sources, who said more exe- : cutions of guards would fol- '■ low. In Teheran, assassins struck at the press for the first time since the February revolution, killing the financial manager of the Teheran evening daily, “Kayhan,” and his 20-year-old son, and wounding the newspaper’s owner. The shadowy Forqan guerrilla group claimed responsibility for the shootings, saying the main target had been Mr Haj Hossein Mehdian, the paper’s owner, whom it had condemned to death for “co-operating with the criminal clergy.” The newspaper was taken over by Islamic militants in May. Tiv. murdered financial manager, Haj Mehdi Araghi, spent a total of 15 years in the Shah’s jails — 13 of them for his part in the murder of the Prime Minister (Mr Hassan Ali Mansour) in January, 1965, by an extreme Right-wing religious guerrilla group, the Fedayan Islam. “Kayhan” reported that two women members of the Trotskyite Socialist Workers’ Party had been condemned to life imprisonment in the oil-rich province of Khuzestan for inciting people to : take up armed struggle, and > plotting against the Islamic < people. 1

In a separate message to the Non-Aligned Movement countries, scheduled to meet in Havana n- week, he said: “The new (Iranian) Government, while claiming to be non-aligned, is bombarding and harming minorities like the Turkomans, the Kurds, and the Arabs, and sending young people to the firing squad. “This despotic regime has declared a jihad (holy war) against a Muslim people, the Kurds, and is* encouraging fratricide in the name of religion.”