Category Archives: Peshmerga

In the Kurdish Diaspora

By Dr Jan Best de Vries: Motorclub Median Empire has its headquarters in Cologne, Germany, but counts divisions in several other German cities and is also represented in my home village Baarn, The Netherlands. It is an open club, that is to say that its members are not all Kurds living in Germany, their trainer in…

Finders keepers, losers weepers

Evin Cheikosman

 By Evin Cheikosman: Congratulations to the Kurdish men and women, who have expelled the Islamic State from Kobanê on January 26th, and are now working harder to extend their influence to the surrounding areas currently under IS control. Support for the YPG, YPJ, and the Peshmerga is growing on many levels: Internationally: The U.S. led…

Support the family of Hujam Surchi and other Peshmerga families in need

KT News: The brutal execution of Peshmerga commander Hujam Surchi has affected not only people in Kurdistan, but also Kurds in diaspora communities worldwide. Hujam was kidnapped by ISIS in August and he was beheaded last week, as publicized in a video by the terrorists in which he displayed dignified courage at the hands of…

This is our war and the KRG must give top priority to defence strategy

By Arian Mufid: The opening weeks of 2015 have involved heavy bloodshed and martyrdom for Kurds in the south of Kurdistan. While in west Kurdistan ISIS (Daesh) forces were forced to retreat from Kobani, in the southern, Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), areas ISIS has been on an almost continual offensive on several fronts, to an…

What Else Would it Take?!

By Dr. Rashid Karadaghi: A performance of Macbeth without Macbeth, Hamlet without Hamlet! On January 23rd, a conference of the US-led coalition against ISIS was held in London hosted by the U.S. and Britain and attended by over twenty countries to discuss ways and means of fighting the terrorist organization. What was striking about this…

Sorry Charb – We Couldn’t Protect You!

Mohammed Ismail

By Mohammed Ismael: I am not French; I do not understand the French language. I can’t cite any French authors. French culture is totally foreign to me. Should I visit France it would be a total culture shock for me. But today I know how the French feel. I want to speak French and sing…

Powerful, yet are they Useless?

Evin Cheikosman

By Evin Cheikosman: The revolutions throughout the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) have opened many doors that have been locked for centuries; and one of those doors leads into the topic of women’s rights.  If we take a moment to reflect on the uprisings that have taken place this past year and the numerous…

Poetry in Exile

Yasin Aziz

By Yasin Aziz: ‘The refuge we all seek is protection from forces which wrench us away from the security and comfort, physical and mental, which give dignity and meaning to human existence’ Aung San Suu Kyi Exile from country, family, social life, the atmosphere one is used to for many years: the warm social relations,…

ISIS Can Be Defeated and Eliminated by Kurds

By Arian Mufid: For the Kurds, August 2014, when ISIS attacked the KRG (Kurdistan Regional Government) areas and tried to approach Erbil, represents so much more than just another example of Arab nationalism tarnished with Islam. ISIS was supported by Iraqi Arab nationalists and local Arab tribes in Mosul who wanted them to take control…

150 Peshmargas ‘fly to Turkey’, planning to join YPG in Kobani

KT News: Around 150 Peshmargas from the Kurdistan Region have today flown out of Erbil to join the prolonged battle against ISIS in Kobani, according to media reports. The soldiers were said to be flying to Silopi in Turkey, from where they would travel by road across the Syrian border to the besieged Kurdish town…

Kurdish reinforcements to Kobane and embedded journalists

By a Kurd in Washington: Dear KT, Is it possible that Kurdish journalists in the Kurdistan Region could request that the Ministry of Peshmerga allows a few Kurdish journalists to be embedded with the Kurdish reinforcements which will be deployed in Kobane? This is extremely important as they can report to the world how heroically the…

IS, Turkey and the Kurdish Question

By Zwan Mahmod: The advance of the Islamic State (IS) in the past year across, first in Syria and then Iraq, both surprised and worried players in the region. Its incursions into northern and western Iraq led to the fall of prime Nouri-Al Maliki as Iraqi Prime Minister and it forced Kurdish involvement. Ground fighting…

Peshmargas make strategic gain, recapturing Mount Zartak

KT News: Peshmerga forces made an important strategic advance yesterday by recapturing Mount Zartak in a battle that left more than 30 ‘Islamic State’ (IS) gunmen dead. The mountain overlooks the Nineveh province plain stretching to Mosul. IS terrorists who recently occupied nearby villages are now within reach of Kurdish firepower. Bookmark on Delicious Recommend…

The rise of IS in Iraq and Syria

By Arian Mufid: To understand what IS is about, one must also know who they are and their true identity. How did the world come a point that is, I think, similar to September 11th, 2001? The complex network of IS (also known as ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham) was born following…

A sufficient defensive power is a neglected Kurdish right

Shakhawan Shorash

By Shakhawan Shorash: The rebuilding of the Iraqi state was a difficult and complicated process, and the transitional steps were without reliable solutions to the underlying negative factors that had previously caused the conflict and war. The key problems were marginalized and there were several inadequate solutions to them. One of the mistakes was the…