Qazi Muhammad was an Iranian Kurdish religious and political leader who founded the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan and headed the short-lived, Soviet-backed Republic of Mahabad. He was hanged by the Iranian government for treason in 1947.

The Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, also known as the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI), is an armed leftist ethnic party of Kurds in Iran, exiled in northern Iraq. It is banned in Iran and thus not able to operate openly. The group calls for self-determination of Kurdish people, and has been described as seeking either separatism or autonomy within a federal system.