Indiscriminate Attack on Kurdish Cross-border Couriers Injures One
06:17 - 16 May 2015
Kurdpa: Another Kurdish cross-border courier (kolbar) became the victim of another indiscriminate and lethal attack of Islamic Republic of Iran’s border security forces.
Kurdistan News Agency, Kurdpa has learned that “Mohajer” a Kurdish courier from the suburbs of Wurme (West Azarbijan province) was injured in early morning of Thursday 14 May, as a result of direct shooting of Islamic Republic of Iran’s border security forces.
A source told Kurdpa that he was shot around his village of “Kole Behi”. He was critically injured and transferred to one of Wurme’s hospitals.
So far, Kurdpa has documented 64 deaths and injuries to individuals working as ‘kolbar’, couriers that carry goods on their backs across the border.
The neglected Kurdish areas of Iran are marked by a general dearth of economic infrastructure and development proportionate to the population, resulting in high rates of poverty and unemployment, the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran reported in their 2012 report.
Masoud Kurdpour, now an imprisoned journalist, told Deutsche Welle news agency in an interview in April 2011: “You see all the individuals who are kolbar and who die for this. This phenomenon of working as a kolbar shows that the economic situation of the region is so bad that people are forced to take on a job that has a security component and carries the danger of death and being shot.”
The Iranian government puts the unemployment rate for the region at 14 percent, but local experts and activists say this number is a misrepresentation and the real rate is well over 20 percent, and even much higher among the younger population just entering the labor market.
Writing by Kurdpa Staff Writers and editing by Hazhir B.
Kurdistan News Agency, Kurdpa has learned that “Mohajer” a Kurdish courier from the suburbs of Wurme (West Azarbijan province) was injured in early morning of Thursday 14 May, as a result of direct shooting of Islamic Republic of Iran’s border security forces.
A source told Kurdpa that he was shot around his village of “Kole Behi”. He was critically injured and transferred to one of Wurme’s hospitals.
So far, Kurdpa has documented 64 deaths and injuries to individuals working as ‘kolbar’, couriers that carry goods on their backs across the border.
The neglected Kurdish areas of Iran are marked by a general dearth of economic infrastructure and development proportionate to the population, resulting in high rates of poverty and unemployment, the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran reported in their 2012 report.
Masoud Kurdpour, now an imprisoned journalist, told Deutsche Welle news agency in an interview in April 2011: “You see all the individuals who are kolbar and who die for this. This phenomenon of working as a kolbar shows that the economic situation of the region is so bad that people are forced to take on a job that has a security component and carries the danger of death and being shot.”
The Iranian government puts the unemployment rate for the region at 14 percent, but local experts and activists say this number is a misrepresentation and the real rate is well over 20 percent, and even much higher among the younger population just entering the labor market.
Writing by Kurdpa Staff Writers and editing by Hazhir B.
