Iranian Journalist Joins Ukraine’s Foreign Legion
Kourosh Sehati, a former journalist of the British TV channel Iran International, has joined Ukraine’s Foreign Legion. His story became known thanks to a Radio Liberty report.
Sehati became the first known Iranian to join the ranks of Ukraine’s Foreign Legion. Previously, he was a human rights activist in Iran, where he was repeatedly arrested for political activities. In 2004, he fled Iran to Turkey, where he received political refugee status. He later moved to the United States, where he worked for Voice of America’s Persian Service and obtained American citizenship.
According to Sehati, he decided to defend Ukraine against the “club of dictators and invaders,” which he associates with Russian president vladimir putin and his allies, including the Iranian clerical regime, Belarusian leader alexander lukashenko, as well as the regimes of North Korea and China.
His decision was influenced not only by political convictions but also personal motives. “I feel a connection with Ukraine because my wife is Ukrainian, and our children are half Ukrainian,” he explained, adding that his family lives in London.
Beyond family ties, his position has deep historical roots connected to long-standing Iranian-Russian contradictions. In the 19th century, Persia and the Russian Empire fought wars that resulted in Moscow gaining control over most of the Caucasus. Subsequently, the Russian Empire sought to control Iran’s natural resources and repeatedly occupied its territories. In the 1940s, the Soviet Union supported short-lived Kurdish and Azerbaijani republics in northwestern Iran, causing ethnic tensions that continue to this day.
Sehati also noted that one of his motives for joining the Foreign Legion was to change perceptions about Iranians. “I’m trying to show solidarity between Iranians and Ukrainians so that Ukrainians don’t associate Iranians with the actions of the Islamic Republic,” he said.
