US Backs Kurdish Rebels In Iran
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--Hersh: US Backs Kurdish Rebels in Iran--

By Foreign News Desk
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
zaman.com

The United States, which has promised Ankara to end the existence of the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) in northern Iraq, is reportedly backing the group’s Iranian wing PEJAK in a secret ploy to destabilize the country.

Renowned American journalist Seymour Hersh claimed that Washington, and Israel, have been providing PEJAK with training and equipment over the last six months.

Hersh’s striking allegations were in his latest article published in the New Yorker magazine.
Hersh discussed the possibility of a U.S. intervention in Iran; after the Republicans lost their majority in the U.S. congressional elections and the subsequent resignation of Donald Rumsfeld.
Hersh argued that although the CIA had not found any “absolute” evidence on Tehran’s nuclear weapons program, a military operation was still on the agenda.

During former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s era, the number of covert military operations in the region increased, said Hersh.

He explained that Washington backed the PKK’s Iranian wing PEJAK in order to destabilize the Iranian administration.

A government adviser with close links to the U.S. Department of Defense said that PEJAK would realize secret cross-border operations, “as a part of its plans to find alternative ways to pressure Iran”.