ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – The Kurdistan Region’s role toward Iranian Kurdish opposition groups has been “very positive,” a senior opposition member told The New Region on Thursday, dismissing as “propaganda” the recent reports of the groups’ disarmament and expulsion from Iraqi territory by Iran. 

Tehran has long pushed to disarm and expel Kurdish opposition groups based in the Kurdistan Region and has long pressured both Baghdad and Erbil to hand over their members.  On Tuesday, Iran’s ambassador to Iraq said Baghdad has agreed to expel the groups and turn them over to Tehran during an Iran-Iraq joint security meeting. 

No Erbil representatives were present at the meeting, according to the Kurdistan Region's interior minister.

“The Kurdistan Regional Government [KRG] has played a very positive role until this moment. We take their political situation into consideration,” Amanj Zibaee, a senior member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI), a prominent opposition group, told The New Region. 

The KDPI is “aware of events in Baghdad,” and the group has “not received any official statement on this matter,” he said. “All of this falls within the sphere of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s propaganda.”

The Iranian Kurdish official further criticized Mohammad Kazem Al-e Sadegh, Iran’s ambassador to Iraq, as “not a diplomatic representative” but rather “a representative of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps [IRGC].” 

On Wednesday, the Iraqi government said Baghdad is coordinating with Tehran through a “high-level committee” to resolve the issue of the Iranian Kurdish opposition groups' presence in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region. 

The dissident Kurdish parties from western Iran’s Kurdish-majority areas (Rojhelat) are based in the Kurdistan Region and have long been military targets for Iran, with frequent drone and missile strikes targeting their bases.

“Iraq is a legitimate government and the host country, and it has the authority and legitimacy to make such a decision,” he said, adding that the KDPI “has not received any such request” so far.

In 2023, Iraq and Iran signed a security agreement under which Baghdad pledged to disarm and relocate the Iranian Kurdish opposition groups from border areas, following repeated warnings from Tehran.

Since the outbreak of the US-Israeli war on Iran in February, the groups have been targeted by hundreds of drone and missile strikes. 

Iran’s IRGC has repeatedly cited alleged cross-border offensives as the pretext for its attacks on the opposition groups in the Kurdistan Region.

The Iranian Kurdish opposition groups have collectively rejected the allegations.

“The Islamic republic has always tried to target the Kurdish opposition parties through missile strikes, bombardments, and terrorist attacks,” Zibaee stressed, explaining that the strikes are carried out because of the legitimacy the opposition groups hold among the Kurds in Iran.