Reports of relative peace and tranquility in southern Kurdistan (aka Iraqi Kurdistan) should be taken with a pinch of salt, going by reliable but largely ignored reports coming from the region. Sectarian conflict is not the problem, as it is in the rest of Iraq, but rather repeated Iranian bombardment of villages in the mountainous border region.

Southampton-based research student Khalid Khedri writes to tell me that during the last month Iranian military forces have shelled several areas around the Iraqi border, including villages from Haji Omeran to Penjwen province. Many residents have been displaced, grain stores, orchards and fields torched, and forest fires lit.

The military action has been reported by reliable sources on the ground in southern Kurdistan, but the news tends to get buried on the inside pages of the western press, and is barely mentioned at all in TV and radio bulletins.

Khedri refers also to Turkish involvement in the current bombardment, but this is not backed up by agency reports. What we do know is that Turkish forces have been massing along the border in a highly offensive posture. However, there was a report in July of a relatively small-scale artillery strike by the Turks inside Iraq after three of its troops were killed by a Kurdish landmine.

The Iranian aggression has now led to a formal complaint being lodged by the Iraqi government, but Tehran refuses to acknowledge responsibility for the shelling.