QANDIL MOUNTAINS, Iraq (Agencies): A spokeswoman for the Iranian-wing of a Kurdish rebel group has warned of potential suicide attacks against American interests in Iraq and Turkey to punish the United States for sharing intelligence with Turkey after last week’s Turkish bombardment. Turkey’s military said more than 150 Kurdish rebels were killed in Friday’s air strikes against bases of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party or PKK on Mt Qandil, which sits on the Iraqi-Iranian border. The PKK fights for autonomy in Turkey’s southeast and also has a wing that is fighting for Kurdish rights in Iran. Peritan Derseem, a senior official with the rebel group’s Iranian-wing PEJAK, blamed the United States for helping Turkey in an interview late Sunday.
“We have changed our stand toward the United States government and we are standing against them now,” she said. “Maybe someday … individual combatants might launch suicide attacks inside Iraq and Turkey, and even against American interests.” Derseem explained that there was a temptation among some rebels to join suicide squads to avenge the deaths of their comrades but that “combatants are under the control of the organization,” which she said is against such attacks.
