Name: Rustam Kamravan

Dear Sir,

I was reading your weblog:

http://advocacynet.org/wordpress-mu/farzin/

Your weblog in my humble opinion is essentially promoting pan-Turkism under the guise of “human rights”. This is a very well known technique by now and has been used by many groups in order to promote geo-political interests. But I give you credit for being polite and mannered. You know there are dozens (if not hundreds) of pan-Turkic vulgar weblogs who curse at other Iranians, Armenians, Kurds and etc. I am Shomali/Kermanshahi and I do not consider myself minority. I am proud to be Persian/Iranian. However I had some points to raise with regards to what is on your weblog.

I do not know if the 20% Iranian Azeris see themselves as a minority, but they have been well represented in politics in Iran. Obviously not all Azeris agree with you.

Note I get the 20% because ethnologue (2009) says 11.6 million and this actual census states around 21.6%:

http://www.terrorfreetomorrow.org/upimagestft/TFT%20Iran%20Survey%20Report%200609.pdf

http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=IR

11.6 million based on 2001.

And based on the latest province statistics:

http://www.statoids.com/uir.html

If we take the areas of predominantly Azerbaijani speaking population, that is East Azerbaijan, Zanjan, Ardabil and half of West Azerbaijan (although thereare sources that mention majority Kurdish speakers), we obtain: 6.96 million. So this is rounded up to 7 million. If we assume 1.5 million in Qazvin, Hamadan (actual statistics done put Turcophone population at 28%), Gilan, Arak and everywhere else in Iran except Tehran, we can safely say it is 1.5 million. This is now 8.5 million. Now in Tehran, about 95% of people speak Persian as their first language according to Hamshahri and many Azerbaijanis there have adopted Persian, have mixed with other Iranians and have become “Tehranis”. Despite this, if we assume 4 million Azerbaijani Turcophones in Tehran (which is an upperboud), we obtain 12.5 million.

So you say 50% of Iranians are minorities. That is not true if you consider Azeris a “minority” (Shi’a Muslims are not minorities in the Islamic republic). It would be more like 30-35% are “linguistic minorities” in Iran. Note in the census I brought, 100% of Iranians can speak Persian today and 20% say they understand Azeri. So the fact that all Iranians can understand one language helps communications in Iran and progress. However, Azeris in terms of politics, business, education and etc. are not a minority and are well represented if not over represented.

The only issue that is constantly brought is teaching of native languages. The language issues, this was not an issue 100 years ago, since Persian was chosen as the official language by the constitutional revolution. Minority languages in Iran are not banned and have never been thought in the Qajar era in the traditional Maktab system. In Iran though they are not banned. They are simply not thought in elementary school. That is no different than many countries. For example in Germany or France, they do not teach Turkish or Arabic in elementary schools for the Turks and Arabs living in these areas. Or in the USA, despite the fact that Spanish pre-dates English in many places (say Arizona, New Mexico, California) and despite the large Hispanic population of these areas, elementary school education is done in Spanish.

Unlike the republic of Azerbaijan and Turkey, in Iran, minority languages have university courses, state t.v. programs, magazines, music and etc. The traditional schooling system in the Qajar era only had Persian and Arabic. And the current system pretty much follows that trend. This has been a system for the last 1000 years. So to say Azeri is banned is an outright lie. It is simply not thought in the elementary level. Much like Turkish is not thought in German schools or Spanish in English schools in the elementary level. The negative attitude towards Turkish language was in large part due to irredentist concepts coming from the Ottoman empire and the head of these negative attitudes were Azerbaijanis like Kasrawi, Taqi Arrani, Kazemzadeh Iranshahr, Afshars and etc. Have you considered this issue?

See for example:

Touraj Atabaki, “Recasting Oneself, Rejecting the Other: Pan-Turkism and Iranian Nationalism” in Van Schendel, Willem (Editor). Identity Politics in Central Asia and the Muslim World: Nationalism, Ethnicity and Labour in the Twentieth Century. London, GBR: I.B.Tauris&Company, Limited, 2001. Actual Quote:

Do you think with 20 million Kurds in Turkey, 1 million Talysh in the country of Azerbaijan and etc. that Iran should also seek pan-Iranism and promote it? I mean 76-80% of the population of Iran speaks closely related Iranian languages. If Uighyur is 20% close to Azeri, then Kurdish is at least 50% the same vocabulary with Persian. Its core basic vocabulary is about 80% the same. So far Iran has not done this, but it seems response to threatening irredentism ideologies (with a history of genocides like the Armenian, Assyrian, Greek genocides) might be this. Either way,  here is why I think your website promotes pan-Turkism under the guise of Human Rights.

A) The cartoon issue has no insults and you are being dishonest.

http://www.azargoshnasp.net/Pasokhbehanirani/SuskhaavaPanturkisthaa.htm

You know well nama and sanana are every day words used in Tehran. The cartoon was not pointed at Azeris. Even Mana Neyestani has admitted that he had no intention on the cartoon.

B) You protest for Uighyurs in China. Why not for Kurds in Turkey or Talysh in Arran or Tajiks in Uzbekistan or Kurds in Syria or etc? Thus you protest for Uighyurs because as you say 20-30% of the words they use are related to Turkic of Azerbaijan (which may or may not be true).

Okay so 50-60% of Kurdish (the Kermanshahi and Elami version about 80%) is the same or related to Persian. Same say with Talyshi or etc. Do you think Iran should also setup pan-Iranist movements under the guise of human rights?

C) You say Said Matinpour went to a conference in Turkey to address the rights of “Turkic speaking populations”. Why if he is into human rights, he did not protest the rights of Kurdish minorities and other minorities there? Any neutral observors knows one cannot compare the Kurds situation to Azerbaijanis in Iran. Infact I’ll be happy to trade all Iranic Kurds of Turkey (who have a higher birth population and are getting close to 20 million) for any Azerbaijani in Iran that does not feel Iranian and instead feels connections to Uighyurs or Turkic romanticist of Turkey and etc.

D) Fakhteh Zamani, Gunaz t.v. and etc. where do they get their funding? Also Miss. Zamani has already called Iran “a so called country” and has called even Kurdish opposition groups like KDP as terrorist.

http://www.kavehfarrokh.com/articles/pan-turanism/the-futility-of-advocating-pan-turanism-the-case-of-madame-zamani/

Then she deleted the petition in order to exactly so that the cover of “human rights” under the core of her pan-Turkism remains veiled. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on your viewpoint, the internet archives has recorded the petition.

E) “Guney Azerbaijan” for the real Azerbaijan is not historically correct. One can say Eastern Armenia for the republic of Azerbaijan is more correct. Or call parts of it Northern Talyshistan, Southern Lezginistan. Call Turkey as Eastern Armenia or Norther Kurdistan and etc.

However lets say if separatism is good. Then it is good for everyone right? So Armenians in Karabagh who voted overwhelmingly to separate should be allowed to do so right? Ossetians and Abkhaz in Georgia too. How about Kurds in Turkey? Talysh, Lezgins in Azerbaijan? Tajiks of Uzbekistan and etc. We can’t have double standards. In fact I have no problem with such elections because you know what would happen:

1) Azeris in Iran will stay in Iran as overwhelmingly do not supports the likes of Chehregani, Zamani, and etc.

2) Kurds in Turkey will separate, Zazas too.

3) Armenians in the republic of Azerbaijan will separate, Lezgins too, Talysh too.

F) Pan-Turkist historiography. Babak Khorramdin was not Azerbaijani, because the ethnicity Azerbaijani-Turkic speakers was not formed in Azerbaijan then. He pre-dates the arrival of Oghuz Turks who are the main component of the Azerbaijan language by at least three centuries. The Khorramdin, an off-shoot of Mazdaki Zoroastrianism is correct. Western academic sources say Minorsky, even Bernard Lewis are clear he was not Turkic. So are classical Arabian, Persian and Armenian sources.

Thus that is why I believe you are promoting geo-political pan-Turkism under the guise of human rights.

Iran might be in a bad geopolitical situation, but this situation might not necessarily last forever. During this bad geopolitical situation, Iran has seen bad will from couple of countries specially (you know which ones). These countries though have problems with Armenians, Greeks and to a larger extent, an ideology which has conflicts with Russia and even now China. Is it prudent on their part to go against 120+ million Iranians (35 million Iranic/Kurds, 60-80 million Iranic/Persians (Iran, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Uzekistan…) and others?

Pan movements usually drive each other. Pan-Turkism promoted now by Turkey and Azerbaijan (and it is interesting genetically the influence of Turks were very little here and Turks were mainly nomads who did not have the rich culture of Iranians and Armenians and that is why there is say a claim on Babak), was the ideology that brought up pan-Iranism as a reaction.

Both Turkey and the country of Azerbaijan should be smarter, because it is not certain this Iranian anti-Nationalist government (IRI) will last forever, there are more Kurds in Turkey than Azeris in Iran, there are Armenians in Caucasus and Talysh and etc. So these countries (Armenia included and Arran&Sherwan (historical Azerbaijan) and Turkey and Iran) should work together and minimize outside influence for the sake of the people of the region. Minority rights should be encouraged but not under the guise of pan-Turkism. Iranians might not seem threatening today, but they are well aware of their history and have a historical identity, not one build in the 20th century. They are not going to give up any part of their historical territory.

However, I doubt wisdom will come to pan-Turkists until they create another disaster which will bounce back at them.

www.kavehfarrokh.com