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Meet the Kurdish Female PJAK Fighters of
Kurdistan: ViceTV
27.7.2012
By Nick Gillespie
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Vice TV |
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Since 2004 the PJAK took up arms for self-rule in
Kurdistan province northwestern of Iran (Iranian
Kurdistan, Eastern Kurdistan). Half the members of
PJAK are women. The PJAK has about 3,000 armed
militiamen. Photo: Ekurd.net/ViceTV/YouTube •
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July
27, 2012
Come with us to Kurdistan region in northern
Iraq for a springtime frolic with the lovely lady
guerillas of the Kurdish Liberation Movement.
Video report:
Part 1 |
Part 2 |
Part 3
From Boudica of the British Celts to Corporal
Klinger, few things unsettle the male mind like a
lady in arms. The Kurds of Northern Iraq have long
recognized this principle and incorporated it into
their quest to build a Kurdish homeland in the
overlap between Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria.
Fighting alongside their male comrades in a region
not exactly known for its progressive stance on
women's rights, the female Peshmerga guerillas of
the Kurdish Liberation Movement built a reputation
for themselves in the 70s and 80s as demure
diaboliques with the deadly poise of Leila Khaled or
Tania-era Patty Hearst.
Having secured the northern third of Iraq for
themselves in the aftermath of the first Gulf War,
the Kurds have spent the last two decades divesting
themselves of their guerilla jamjams, building up a
stable and booming economy in their semi-autonomous
little hamlet, and generally enjoying not being in
the middle of the current Iraq War. Up in the hills
abutting Iran and Turkey, however, the struggle for
a Greater Kurdistan continues for boy and girl
alike.
The successors to Iraqi Kurdistan's old rebel
militias are a milk-besodden Alphabits bowl of
various Maoist, quasi-Maoist, and
won't-say-they're-Maoist-but-come-on guerilla
armies. You've got the PKK, the PJAK, the KCK—all of
whom have slightly different tactics, territories,
and ideologies but the same ultimate goal and,
secretly, a lot of the same personnel. More
importantly, they are all completely gender-equal,
just like Mao wanted it. From the highest command to
the lowest potato peeler to the ghillie-suited
sniper on the front lines, dudes and dames do it the
same.
We picked the youngest of these new Kurdish guerilla
groups, PJAK, the Free Life for Kurdistan party, and
drove up to their outpost on the Iranian border to
see how their female fighters are helping their
people draft a definitive answer to the Kurdish
Question that's vexed Middle-Eastern politics for
the last century. And hopefully find an answer to
our own Kurdish Question. Which is, What the fuck is
the Kurdish Question?
Hosted by Thomas Morton | Originally aired in 2012
on http://VICE.com
Follow Thomas on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/@BabyBalls69
Ekurd.net:
The PJAK, or the (Partiya Jiyana Azad a Kurdistane) (Party of Free Life of
Kurdistan), is a militant Kurdish nationalist group based in Kurdistan region in
Iraq's north that
has been carrying out attacks Iranian forces in the Kurdistan Province of Iran
(Eastern Kurdistan) and other Kurdish-inhabited areas.
PJAK is a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Confederation (Koma Civaken
Kurdistan or KCK), which is an alliance of Kurdish groups and divisions
led by an elected Executive Council.
Led by Haji Ahmadi, the PJAK’s objective is to establish a semi-autonomous
regional entities or Kurdish federal states in Iran, Turkey and Syria similar to
the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq.
Since
2004 the PJAK took up arms for self-rule in Kurdistan province northwestern of
Iran (Iranian Kurdistan, Eastern Kurdistan). Half the members of PJAK
are women. The PJAK has about 3,000 armed
militiamen.
The United States on February 4, 2009 added the Iranian Kurdish PJAK militant group
opposed to Iran
to its list of terrorist
organizations.
Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey all have significant
ethnic Kurdish minorities. Estimate to 12 million
Kurds live in Iran.
• Nick Gillespie is editor in chief of Reason.tv
and Reason.com, the online platforms of Reason, the
libertarian magazine of "Free Minds and Free
Markets." The two sites draw over 4 million visits
per month and have been named among the nation's
best political sites by Playboy, Washingtonian,
National Journal, and others. Gillespie is
co-author, with his Reason colleague Matt Welch, of
The Declaration of Independents: How Libertarian
Politics Can Fix What's Wrong With America,
published in June 2011 by Public Affairs.
Copyright ©, respective
author or news agency,
reason.com
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