00:08My guest today on Euronews' 12 Minutes with is the exiled Iranian Kurdish leader Abdullah Mokhtadi.
00:14Sir, thank you so much for joining us on Euronews.
00:17Of course, at this stage, it's a month of this war between Israel, the United States and Iran
00:22because you know there has been speculation, even reports that the Trump administration had suggested
00:28that perhaps you could join in this war against the regime in Tehran.
00:34Is there validity to those claims? Have you had those kind of conversations?
00:38Well, it was not that serious. President Trump decided not to invite Kurds to take part in the campaign.
00:47We are still in defensive positions in Iraqi Kurdistan and we have not crossed the border.
00:57We are under constant shelling by Iranian missiles and drones day and night for about a month now,
01:07but we are still in defensive positions.
01:10So, to that extent, then you are confirming plans were debated, perhaps casually,
01:17but there was an idea before the war started that you could join forces with Israel and the U.S.
01:22Those conversations happened with the Trump administration directly.
01:25It was more an idea rather than a plan.
01:31There's a lot of uncertainty around this operation, what kind of plans the U.S. has in mind,
01:37the timeline to the ultimate goal.
01:40But I wonder if they were to ask you the same question now, would you say,
01:44yes, we will switch from defensive to now offensive because that call could come.
01:49It depends on the situation in Iran.
01:53We are Iranian Kurds. This is our homeland. This is our country. This is our land. This is our ancestors'
02:02land.
02:02So, we have every right to return to our land. It depends how and when. It depends on the situation
02:10on the ground.
02:11If the Iranian regime is weakened enough, sufficiently enough, so that they can make no harm against the civilian people,
02:22against our forces,
02:24then yes, of course, we will be back on our land.
02:26What you're saying is you could join in, but there needs to be conditions on the ground in which the
02:33regime in Tehran is sufficiently degraded.
02:36And you don't think that's the case at this stage?
02:37The coalition of Iranian political parties, which we started almost a month ago, before the war,
02:48is ready to cooperate with our people in Iranian Kurdistan.
02:55We can provide security. We can prevent chaos.
03:00We can prevent massacres by the Iranian security forces.
03:05And we are responsible political parties with massive support from the, among the Iranian Kurds
03:14and a very popular position among the Iranians altogether.
03:19So, we are, we will be, we will be ready to, to go back to our country.
03:27Do you still have faith in the U.S. administration that they can achieve those strategic goals that they laid
03:32out at the beginning,
03:33which was a sort of regime change away from the hardliners and to destroy the nuclear threat?
03:39If they weaken the regime enough, if they crush the security forces, the military industrial base,
03:48not the civilian infrastructure, of course, we're not for that.
03:52But if they hit the Pasdar and the Revolutionary Guards enough, then there may be, it can help the Iranian
04:02people to rise at some point.
04:04In fact, this war started 47 years ago by the Iranian regime.
04:09They confiscated the, stormed the American embassy in Tehran.
04:14They started the terrorist activities all over the region in the Middle East.
04:21They massacred their own people.
04:24They destabilized the whole region.
04:27So, they, they threatened Israel to, that they want to annihilate Israel.
04:36They wanted death to America.
04:38It's 47 years that they are shouting death to America.
04:42In fact, I'm not surprised that the war is happening, because I expected it to happen even decades ago.
04:50To be very specific, the Israelis did say they wanted to create the conditions on the ground for that to
04:56happen.
04:56The leadership obviously belongs to the Iranian people.
04:59But the U.S. did say that they could not work with the Ayatollah, and in fact, his debt.
05:03They also say the Ayatollah Jr., that's how the Trump administration refers to the sun, is an unacceptable choice.
05:10And they also say they're in talks with more reasonable people.
05:14So, from the outside, it does look like a form of regime change.
05:18And I wonder, who are reasonable people for you?
05:20Do you have any names in hand?
05:22No, I do not believe any, any figure in the existing Islamic Republic of Iran to be trustworthy.
05:33No one, not even the head of the parliament.
05:36None of them.
05:36You say that, that's, that, that will not work.
05:38Of course not.
05:39No, no.
05:40There are butchers of Iranian people.
05:42They killed, more than a month ago, in January, they killed 32,000 people in 48 hours.
05:50They are butchers of the Iranian people.
05:53They are criminals.
05:54They are a bunch of criminals.
05:55We do not trust any of them.
05:58For us Iranian people, including Kurdish people, we are for a democratic, secular Iran.
06:04And Iran that respects the rights of Kurds and other nationalities, that respects democracy,
06:13that respects human rights, that respects international law.
06:17None of these figures in Iranian regime, existing regime, can achieve that, can be even near to that code.
06:25So then I wonder, if it's not from people already in Tehran, because they do not work for you,
06:29and you say will not lead to a democratic, secular Iran, what about the opposition?
06:33Who is acceptable in the opposition?
06:35Because we are not seeing opposition externally, and there are no protests in Iran.
06:40That's not happening either.
06:41There are credible oppositions.
06:45Like who?
06:46Inside and outside the country.
06:48Kurds are one of them.
06:49In fact, one of the main opposition forces for the past 47 years, we started, we were against this regime.
06:57We did not accept the Islamic regime of Iran from the outset.
07:04And we are still fighting for our rights and for democracy in Iran.
07:09There are also Baluchis.
07:10There are also Azerbaijanis, Arabs, Persian people.
07:14People started protest movements many, many times in the past decades.
07:20So the Iranian regime has lost all vestiges of credibility and legitimacy.
07:28What role do you see for the Europeans?
07:30Are you satisfied with the messaging coming out of Europe?
07:34In a way, they talk about de-escalating, going back to diplomacy, and at some point, helping out to open
07:39the Strait of Hormuz, but not in the hot face of the war.
07:41Is that a message that you can abide to?
07:45Europeans have pursued a policy of appeasement for decades now towards Iran.
07:50And it's a bankrupt policy.
07:52Iran is a menace, not only for the United States, not only for Israel, not only for Arab countries in
07:58the region.
07:58It is a menace.
08:00It is a terrorist threat against Europeans as well.
08:04They should be more decisive.
08:07They should be more clear.
08:09They should join the United States in its effort to curb the Iranian influence and put an end to a
08:18regime that is a menace, a threat to its own people, to the region, and to the West.
08:25They are anti-American, they are anti-West, they are anti-everybody in the region.
08:30So just so I understand, what you're saying is they should fight this war directly?
08:34They should engage militarily?
08:36I'm not deciding for them, but they should put pressure on Iran.
08:41They shouldn't go for de-escalation with a regime that is a threat to everybody and to the international community.
08:51They should join, if not militarily, at least politically and economically.
08:58They should join force to put an end to this regime and help the Iranian people.
09:05That's what we expect the Europeans to do.
09:07So in that sense, when President Trump is critical of the Europeans and he says they're not helping enough, is
09:12he right?
09:13I'm speaking from the standpoint of the Iranian and the Kurdish people in Iran.
09:18We expect the Europeans to help the Iranian people, to help the Kurdish people, to help women, ethnic groups, religious
09:27minorities, everybody else.
09:29We are under pressure by, we have been under pressure and repression by the Iranian regime for decades now.
09:36Where are Europeans?
09:37Where are the human rights articles?
09:42They should have been more active, more pro-democracy in Iran, more pro-people and less they should decouple with
09:53Iran.
09:54They should put an end to the appeasement policy of appeasement.
09:59Yes.
09:59So when you look at countries like Spain, I'm just wondering, the Spanish prime minister, what does that evoke to
10:05you?
10:06Because he said this war is illegal.
10:07Europe cannot join because this war is illegal.
10:09Massacre is, is massacre legal?
10:12Is terrorism legal?
10:14Iranians, the Iranian regime boasted a couple of years ago that they control five capitals in the region.
10:23And they are, they have organized and financed and armed many proxies, terrorist groups in the whole Middle East.
10:34They are trying to annihilate Israel.
10:38They are trying to expel the United States and the West from the region.
10:43They are reshaping the region according to their, to their adventurous illusions.
10:51So it's time for the Europeans to, to put an end to this policy of appeasement and take a more
11:01active pro-Iranian anti-regime policy.
11:06And let me ask you just as a final question.
11:08The other big regional power, of course, is Turkey.
11:11Have you had any communications with President Erdogan?
11:15Of course, there's also been multiple reports that he does not want to see this war escalate and that he
11:20also doesn't really see a role for you.
11:21Are you having any direct communications or, if not, back-channel dialogue with the Turkish?
11:26Yeah, we've been trying to assure Turkey that we have no bad intentions against Turkey.
11:31We can be friends.
11:33We can be good neighbors, both in Iran and in Iranian Kurdistan with Turkey.
11:39So we are doing no harms to them.
11:41There is no reason for them to be concerned about our intentions and our policies in Iranian Kurdistan.
11:48Okay, well, on that note, thank you so much for joining us on Euronews.
11:52Good to see you and thanks for your time.
11:55Thank you.
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