ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iran has launched a new strike on a Kurdish opposition group’s camp near Erbil, the group said on Tuesday, marking the first such attack by Tehran since it reached a war-end agreement with Washington. The assault is fueling concern that the truce does not include a halt to strikes against Kurdish opposition groups in the Kurdistan Region.
“On Tuesday night, June 16, 2026, the Islamic Republic once again launched a drone attack on the bases of the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran [KDPI],” the group said in a statement, adding that the strike targeted its Zewiya Sipi camp near the city of Koya, east of Erbil.
The KDPI detailed that the camp is a “residential area” housing members of the group’s families, and that it “has been attacked multiple times by the Islamic Republic during the 40-day [Iran] war and even after the declaration of the ceasefire” between Washington and Tehran in early April.
The attack notably comes a day after a senior US administration official told reporters in Washington, including Rudaw, that a war-end memorandum of understanding between Iran and the US has already been signed by President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.
The deal came months after the US and Israel launched a widescale aerial campaign against Iran on February 28, striking thousands of targets across the country during six weeks of hostilities.
In response, Tehran carried out thousands of drone and missile strikes across the Middle East targeting alleged US assets - particularly in Gulf Arab states - as well as launching retaliatory attacks against Israel.
The Iranian response has also included strikes by factions aligned with the Iran-led ‘Axis of Resistance’, including by Iraqi armed groups that have claimed numerous attacks against alleged US targets in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region.
The Kurdistan Region has been hit by at least 865 drones and missiles from late February until last week, according to Rudaw’s tracking, however, though the figure has now risen further.
In its Tuesday statement, the KDPI - the largest Kurdish opposition group - said that “tonight’s drone attack is the Islamic Republic’s first” since the announcement of an end-war agreement with the US.
The group added that its “family camps, medical facilities, and educational centers” have been targeted by Tehran with “more than 138 missiles and drones” since late February.
In a late April interview with Rudaw, Hamid Reza Gholamzadeh, director of Iran’s Diplomatic House and former editor-in-chief of the semi-official Mehr News Agency, said that Iran views the attacks on Kurdish opposition groups in Kurdistan as part of “efforts to secure its border that began even before the [six-week] war.”
He hinted that Tehran would continue to “defend its own security” against them, adding that this issue “is not connected to war. It is more about the security of the borders,” he said.
Of note, Preeminent Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani on Tuesday said during a meeting with US Special Presidential Envoy for Iraq and Syria Tom Barrack in Erbil that the Kurdistan Region has been “unjustly affected” by regional conflicts.
“The Kurdistan Region has always been a catalyst for stability and has supported dialogue and diplomatic solutions to all problems in Iraq and the region,” President Barzani said, adding that while the Region “has never been part of the problems, it has been unjustly affected by the conflicts and tensions of the region.”
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Last Updated at 11:55 pm.
