Shafaq News

On a December Monday night in Erbil, residents’ phones were suddenly flooded with messages, voice notes, and short videos warning of “armed clashes,” “mass displacement,” and “unprecedented security chaos” in the village of Lajan west of the Kurdistan Region’s capital. Within hours, the digital sphere resembled a city on the verge of collapse.

But behind the alarming headlines and anonymous accounts, the reality on the ground was different—more localized, more contained, and far more complex than the sweeping narrative circulating online.

From Local Protest to Story of “Collapse”

The events trace back to a small gathering days earlier near the Lanaz refinery on the Erbil–Kwer road. Residents of Lajan had protested the failure to fulfill commitments to employ local youth at the refinery. As tensions rose between protesters and security forces, the standoff escalated into clashes. Field reports spoke of one protester killed and others wounded, both demonstrators and members of the security forces.

In that charged atmosphere, some politically aligned platforms and anonymous accounts built an alternative narrative. What began as a localized confrontation was reframed as a major security rupture: “the situation exploding,” “armed groups advancing toward the city,” and even claims of “mass flight” and an imminent “civil war.”

A senior security source in Erbil told Shafaq News that the narrative promoted online bore little resemblance to the scale of the actual incident.

“The challenge for security agencies in moments like this is not only on the ground,” the source said, “but in confronting a flood of disinformation that tries to turn every localized incident into a story about the fall of Erbil.”

One clip in particular intensified public anxiety. It showed masked individuals standing on a high location near the Lanaz facility, one of them pointing an RPG launcher toward the refinery while a voice declared in the local dialect: “We will attack if they advance.” For many in Erbil, the visual suggested an open confrontation near a critical energy site—not a clash between protesters and security forces.

Lajan, located in the Khabat district west of Erbil, lies within the complex belt of disputed areas between the federal government and the Kurdistan Region, zones that periodically witness tension due to overlapping party and security influence. The village lies about a 40-minute drive from central Erbil—close enough to fuel unease, far enough to undermine claims that the confrontation occurred “on the city’s doorstep.”

Internal and External “Hands”

After relative calm returned, the Kurdistan Region Security Council (KRSC) issued a lengthy statement revealing that the investigations showed “the involvement of internal and external arms” in the unrest—part of broader “sabotage conspiracies” previously linked to attacks on the Khor Mor gas field, attempts to disrupt electricity production, targeting of refineries, planned explosions in Erbil and Duhok, and the use of partisan and foreign media to incite the public.

The Council said gunfire had been used with the intention of provoking security forces into a deadly response that could then be weaponized to accuse authorities and justify intervention by militias against the Kurdistan Region.

Security agencies, it stated, managed to “expose these plots,” dismantle networks involved in incitement and sabotage, and arrest several individuals who allegedly acted on orders from both domestic actors and militia groups seeking to destabilize the Region.

The Council published the confession of a detainee, Nechirvan Issa Mir, who recounted joining the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) in 2021 and later becoming head of its Branch 14. He claimed that in early 2025, he met with Jawhar Agha Herki in Al-Sulaymaniyah, who told him of coordination with Iran-aligned Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada and instructed him to oversee related activities in Erbil.

The confession detailed alleged meetings in Mosul with a “militia-affiliated” figure called Abu Firas; the recruitment and training of 135 individuals—35 of whom were selected for instruction in surveillance and gunfire; and further coordination “to launch demonstrations inside Erbil” in cooperation with Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada and the PUK.

Mir claimed he was told to incite online on the first day of the Lajan events, join the protests the next day, speak to the media present, and oversee demonstrations that later turned violent, including gunfire at a Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) headquarters and the burning of facilities and cameras.

This linkage between local unrest and networks spanning party, tribal, and armed actors underscores a wider landscape—one not confined to a single village but extending across Iraq’s political and geographic fault lines.

Energy Infrastructure and Test of Security

The Security Council’s narrative explicitly connects the escalation in Lajan and the visible display of weapons to attempts to test security forces’ reactions near critical energy facilities. This comes in the wake of recent attacks on the Khor Mor gas field, electricity stations, and transmission lines. The message, according to a security source, was that threats to the Kurdistan Region’s energy system were no longer limited to rockets and drones from beyond its borders, but could also emerge as internal unrest framed as socioeconomic demands.

Across Erbil’s neighborhoods, life did not reflect the dramatic online imagery. Cafés remained open, traffic flowed normally aside from increased checkpoints, and families spent the evening asking one question: “What is happening in Lajan?”

Many called relatives across Erbil’s districts, while others opened maps on their phones to measure the distance between the city and the village. Each new video—whether an evacuation scene or armored convoys—allowed imagination to outpace official statements.

The security source noted that misleading videos gained traction because they were detached from their original location and timing, presented instead as scenes of an impending internal conflict rather than a localized, containable event.

Media at the Center of the Turbulence

Confusion was compounded by tensions surrounding press access. Rights groups and journalist networks reported that media teams were prevented from reaching Lajan and Khabat, with some equipment damaged. The absence of independent reporting widened the gap between events on the ground and the public perception shaped by partisan outlets and anonymous accounts.

Meanwhile, the KRSC accused opposition-linked and foreign media platforms of amplifying the unrest and fueling escalation as part of a wider “psychological and media warfare” targeting the Region. Media thus became not only an observer but a battleground in the struggle over competing narratives.

This pattern is not new. Whether during missile strikes, salary crises, or political disputes, waves of commentary often appear predicting “the end of the Kurdish experiment” or portraying the authorities in Erbil as unable to protect the city. The recent attack on the Khor Mor gas field—which caused widespread power outages—was framed by some outlets as a “fatal blow” to the Region’s energy network, even though supplies were restored gradually in the following days.

Local crises repeatedly become entry points for wider narratives—some tied to intra-Kurdish political rivalries, others to regional actors seeking to project the Region’s fragility.

Against this backdrop, the confessions about coordination between tribal figures, partisan networks, and armed groups form part of a larger tableau rather than isolated details. The arena is not an isolated village but a sensitive geographic and political node capable of quickly becoming a pressure point on the Region through the dual gateways of security and energy.

A Delicate Federal–Regional Balance

On the federal side, reactions remained limited to general statements that did not translate into clear measures to pursue the armed networks or political actors that Erbil accuses of involvement—directly or indirectly—in the escalation.

KRG authorities, meanwhile, emphasized their own role in managing the situation, announcing the dismantling of networks and arrests linked to plots targeting energy installations. This contrast—between Baghdad’s cautious tone and Erbil’s sharper framing—reinforces the sense that energy security has become one of the most sensitive domains in the broader political struggle. Every incident is now read inside the Region as part of a long series of attempts to undermine its stability through electricity, gas, and oil—not only through political channels.

A Night That Tested Digital-Era Crisis Management

The Lajan incident became a test of crisis management in an age of rapid digital amplification. In a matter of hours, brief clips and sensational headlines created the image of a city on the edge. The reality was less dramatic and more containable—but no less significant in what it revealed about the fragility of the belt surrounding Erbil and the centrality of energy infrastructure in the evolving contest over the Region’s future.

Written and edited by Shafaq News staff.