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On a busy road near Gare du Nord station in Paris, sandwiched between a Bengali grocery and a mobile phone shop, the green door of number 147 rue Lafayette did not stand out. There was no plaque to advertise the first-floor office of the Kurdistan information centre, where three female Kurdish activists had met on Wednesday afternoon. As their dead bodies were removed on stretchers on Thursday morning after what French authorities described as an execution-style killing ...

SNIPPET: "Two brothers of Kurdish origin are being prosecuted by the Swiss authorities on charges of being involved via the internet with an Islamic terrorist group linked to al-Qaeda. The asylum seekers are accused of setting up internet platforms that were designed to attract new members to the recently formed terrorist organisation, issue propaganda, pass on messages to the al-Qaeda network and disseminate details of terror attacks.
 
In addition, the brothers are alleged to have downloaded videos of executions and stored them on their computers.
 
According to the Swiss Federal Prosecutor's Office, the unnamed terrorist organisation was headed by Kurdish extremist cleric Mullah Krekar,...

Mehmet Goren, the father of 15-year-old Muslim schoolgirl Tulay Goren, has been convicted of her murder in a family "honour killing" in London. Tulay, who had come to Britain from the Kurdish region of Turkey, was drugged, tortured and then killed by her father Mehmet Goren, over her relationship with an older man of whom Mehment Goren and his relations did not approve. Although Tulay’s body has never been found, her father Mehmet Goren, 49, was found guilty of murder at the Old Bailey after a 10-week trial. He was also convicted of conspiracy to murder Halil Unal, Tulay’s former...

BAGHDAD — A preparatory session for the upcoming Conference for Cooperation and Coordination between the Iraqi and Kurdistan Ministries of Interior was held here last week, when MoI and KMoI representatives discussed plans to unify their efforts to fight the insurgency and strengthen the nation of Iraq, Aug. 4 – 5. This was the third series of meetings held between MoI and KMoI since January 2009 to discuss issues of security cooperation. Iraqi Maj. Gen. Waleed Hadawi Khalifa, director general of the MoI Planning and Tracking Directorate, served as overall coordinator for the talks. The Kurdistan General Director of Police,...

Peter Pilz, the Austrian Green party's spokesman on security, recently accused Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of taking part in the July 12, 1989 assassinations of Mr. Abdul-Rahman Ghassemlou -- the Secretary- General of the Iranian Kurdish Democratic Party -- and two of his colleagues in Vienna, Austria. "I have no doubt he was involved", said Pilz, adding that Ahmadinejad may have pulled the trigger on one of the guns used to kill the men: Pilz said new eye-witnesses had come forward who had identified Ahmadinejad as being involved in the assassination of Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran chief Abdul Rahman...

ORLANDO, FL -- A small Florida company has turned one of the world's most popular high tech gadgets into a tool for American troops that can help save lives. "They speak with their hands -- a lot," US Army Sergeant Darren Williams said, remembering the times he worked to communicate with the local people during his year as a soldier in Iraq. "If you grab something, or if you say, 'Hold it.' Or, 'Pick it up. Pick it up.' You use that a lot, too," the Jacksonville-based Army recruiter said, waving his hands through a series of gestures. For Williams,...

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SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq — U.S. troops arrested an Iranian man during an early morning raid on a hotel in this northern Iraqi city Thursday and accused him of helping to smuggle a deadly type of roadside bomb into Iraq . But the Kurdistan Regional Government in a statement called the arrest "illegitimate," said the man was a member of a trade delegation that had been invited to Sulaimaniyah by the local government and demanded that he be released. "Actions like these serve no one," the statement said. The United States has detained several Iranians in Iraq in the past year and...

Kurdish guerillas launch clandestine war in Iran By Damien McElroy in the Qandil mountains Last Updated: 1:54am BST 10/09/2007 Kurdish guerrillas have launched a clandestine war in north-western Iran, ambushing troops as they seek Western backing to secure an ethnic homeland. Kurdish fighters in training. Iran claims that the US is secretly supporting Kurdish attacks upon its infrastructure and troops In retaliation, the Iranian army has carried out a series of counter-attacks in the mountains, which span the border with Iraq. Murat Karayilan, a Kurdish guerilla commander, told The Daily Telegraph that Teheran had originally tried to recruit the outlawed...

Arbil, Aug 16, (VOI) – A 340-strong Kurdish Peshmerga force was sent to northwestern Iraq's district of Sinjar to restore security and provide protection to the afflicted community, an official Peshmerga source said on Thursday. "The force will remain in the district until the security situation is secure," Peshmerga Commander Maj. Gen. Aziz Waizy told the independent news agency Voices of Iraq (VOI).

Four major Iraqi political parties unveiled an new governing coalition of moderate Shia and Kurdish parties on Tuesday. The deal formalized an alliance between Maliki's Dawa Party, Vice President Adel Abdel Mehdi's Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC), Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and Massud Barzani's Kurdish Democratic Party (PDK), giving the four parties a parliamentary majority. If the alliance remains intact, they will be positioned to push through legislative initiatives. One of the new blocs goals, according to Prime Minister Maliki, would be to address charges that his government is biased against Sunnis, which could prove a difficult task...

Turkey bombards Kurdish border villages By Damien McElroy in Kashan Valley, northern Iraq Last Updated: 3:16am BST 26/06/2007 On a mountain ridge overlooking a riverside picnic spot in Kashan, Roshad Adel picked at the broken soil. Within minutes he was holding a handful of shrapnel. Kurdish army guards in Kashan Valley, northern Iraq Looking at the twisted pieces of metal glistening in the sun, the threads of rifling clearly visible, the 23-year-old described how his brother was hit by such a chunk of metal as the family slept in a tent nearby. "It was midnight, we were all asleep when...

Turkish and Iranian forces shelled Kurdish rebel positions across the border in northern Iraq, Iraqi Kurd officials reported Friday, amid fears that the conflict could open a new front in Iraq. Turkey has been building up its forces along the border with Iraq, and its leaders are debating whether to stage a major incursion to pursue separatist rebels who cross over from bases in Iraq to attack Turkish targets. Such an operation could ignite a wider conflict involving Iraqi Kurds, and disrupt Turkey's ties with its NATO ally, the United States. Iran has also clashed with Iranian Kurd fighters who...

IRBIL —The Kurdish Regional Government assumed control of security in three provinces from Coalition forces at a ceremony here Wednesday. U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon, commander of Multi-National Division-North, and South Korean Maj. Gen. Yoon Young-Bum, commander of Multi-National Division-Northeast, signed a memorandum of understanding with Nechiran Barzoni, prime minister of the KRG, to return control of security to Dahuk, Irbil and Sulaymaniyah provinces in Iraq. The Kurdish region has set the example for the rest of Iraq, said Mixon. While each province is traditionally turned over one at a time from Coalition to Iraqi control, the KRG...

Kurdish troops comprise a significant part of the Iraq Army contingent in the joint counter-insurgency mission in Baghdad. Three Iraq Army brigades from the autonomous Kurdistan region in the North have been deployed to Baghdad as part of the counter-insurgency operation being conducted with the United States. Officials said the brigades, with about 7,500 troops, are already in Baghdad, Middle East Newsline reported. Officials said insurgency strikes have dropped by 80 percent since the Baghdad security operation was launched more than a week ago. They said the biggest drop was in operations by the Iranian-sponsored Mahdi Army in the city....

Iranian photographer Jahangir Razmi, took 70 pictures of an execution in Kurdistan on Aug. 27, 1979. One picture (No. 20, below) won the Pulitzer Prize. It was, however, awarded to an unnamed photographer -- the only anonymous recipient in the 90-year history of the award. Mr. Razmi preserved 27 of the photos on a contact sheet and stowed it away in his home. Below are those photos -- made public for the first time. Photos: http://online.wsj.com/public/page/8_0004.html VIDEO - interview of WSJ reporter's story about identifying the photographer http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/info-iranpics0611-28.html

Condoleezza Rice in Iraqi Kurdistan after Baghdad ERBIL (Iraq) - the American Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived Friday morning at Erbil, principal city of Iraqi Kurdistan, for discussions with the president of the autonomous area of Kurdistan Massoud Barzani, noted a journalist of AFP. Mrs. Rice had arrived Thursday to Iraq, in Baghdad, for a surprised visit intended to encourage the process of national reconciliation Iraqi, after visits in Israel and in the Palestinian territories. The American Secretary of State must go to London later in the course of the day to take part in the meeting of...

EL CAJON A fire ripped through an Islamic center early Thursday morning, causing $2 million in damages before it was put out, officials said. The three-alarm fire at the Kurdish Community Islamic Center was reported just after 2 a.m. and burned for more than an hour before firefighters from 15 different crews extinguished it, said Monica Zech, a spokeswoman for the El Cajon Fire Department. "When they got here, there was heavy smoke coming from the building and then the fire broke through the roof and flames were shooting through the roof," Zech said. "It's pretty much a total loss."...

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Clashes erupted Friday between two Iraqi army units following a roadside bombing north of the capital, and Iraqi police said a Shiite soldier was killed in an exchange of fire with a Kurdish unit. The U.S. military and Iraqi police provided differing accounts of the incident, which began with a roadside bombing near Duluiyah, about 45 miles north of Baghdad. The Americans said one soldier from the Iraqi army's 1st Battalion, 3rd Brigade, 4th Division was killed and 12 were wounded in the attack. But Iraqi police 1st Lt. Ali Ibrahim said four were killed and three...

Iraq has expressed concern about troop build-ups by both Iranian and Turkish forces along their borders with Iraq. Outgoing foreign minister Hoshyar Zebari said Iran had been told of Iraqi concerns but said his country wanted to resolve any problems through dialogue. On the formation of Iraq's new government, Mr Zebari expressed scepticism that including Sunni leaders could help to reduce violence. It is hoped a new government will be announced within the next week. Border tensions Recent weeks have seen a number of cross-border bombardments by Iranian troops along Iraq's north-east border, directed against Iranian Kurdish opposition groups taking...