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| The historical "Khudafarin Bridges" over the Araz River are also called the Bridges of Longing. |
Shortly after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, amid the turmoil of the Nagorno-Karabakh wars and internal tensions in the Republic of Azerbaijan, the policy of the Islamic Republic focused on promoting the idea that Azerbaijanis from northern Aras are an inseparable part of the Iranian people. At that time, the authorities were so adamant that they even rejected the Azerbaijani President Heydar Aliyev, referring to him as Heydar Alizadeh. Now, although not much time has passed since those days, the situation has drastically changed, and any mention of the connection between the north and south of the Aras River is avoided.
In the present historical context, on the one hand, a comprehensive movement has emerged in the south of the Aras in the form of a civil and national cultural movement, which has deeply rooted and blossomed. On the other hand, in northern Aras, Azerbaijanis, who were able to preserve and develop their national culture during the Soviet Union era, are gradually overcoming the challenges brought on by war and the inevitable turmoil after independence, entering a stage of significant economic, political, and civil growth.
In the era of communications, with the advent of satellites and the internet, the borders of information have been eliminated. The days when the Iranian government felt comfortable about the situation on the other side of the border, during the rivalry between the two superpowers, when the people of Azerbaijan in Iran were unaware of what was happening across the border and suffered under the lash of civil repression, are long gone. Now, the West is no longer worried about the national identity movements it once saw as a gateway for communism to infiltrate Iran, and the north no longer serves as an information and military barrier for the people of South Azerbaijan.
In these conditions, the recent propaganda campaign by Pan-Iranist circles, both inside and outside the country, can be viewed from this perspective. Regardless of whether we accept the theory of the subtle infiltration of Pan-Iranists into governmental bodies, or whether we see it as a tool for the Islamic Republic to employ the remnants of the Pahlavi regime, the outcome ultimately reflects the alignment of the Islamic Republic's current policies with those of the Pahlavi regime regarding the issue of the connection between northern and southern Azerbaijan.
The adherence to Aryan ancient slogans and the fabrication of history in glorifying the bloodthirsty kings of the past is a result of the need for national mobilization in a time when the West is increasing its pressure on the Islamic Republic. However, it seems that at least regarding the historical claims of the Turks of Iran, the primary reason for distancing between the economic, civil, and political conditions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in the north of the Aras and the oppressed people of the south is becoming clearer, and the ties between politicians and racist circles in the Islamic Republic are better understood.
In the present circumstances, it is natural that the people of South Azerbaijan compare their civil and economic conditions with those in the north. In this context, if the Pan-Iranists do not deny any connection between them outright, what answers can they provide to the people of South Aras?
If we compare the situation of the Turkic people on both sides of the Aras during the Constitutional Revolution period, when their economic and cultural development was relatively similar, despite many years having passed since the northern Azerbaijan joined Russia, how do they justify the stark differences we see today?
We, the people of South Aras, who are five times more numerous than those in the north, and were, according to Pan-Iranists, the guardians of Iran’s territorial integrity, how is it that in terms of culture, economy, and human development, we are in such a dire situation, while our brothers and sisters in the north, who were supposedly separated from the motherland and under communist oppression, are in much better circumstances? How do they explain the following:
According to official statistics from Iranian authorities, the level of education in the Azerbaijan provinces in Iran has fallen to the bottom ranks of the country, whereas in the north of the Aras, illiteracy is not an issue. Clearly, if the historical connection between the south and north of the Aras is accepted, the Pan-Iranists can no longer attribute the low educational level in South Azerbaijan to the supposed weakness of the Turkic people's intellect.
While, according to official statistics, women in Ardabil and many other areas of Azerbaijan are in much lower human development categories, and women in South Azerbaijan are hunted by the moral police to prevent even a strand of hair from showing, in the north of Azerbaijan, world gymnastics competitions for girls are held in Baku, where Azerbaijani girls achieve great success, placing well among 150 participants from countries across the globe. Meanwhile, girls in South Azerbaijan are not allowed to play simple games, even while wearing the hijab.
While the people of South Azerbaijan witness daily the hanging of victims of social and economic anomalies, people in the north of the Aras live in a society where crime rates are decreasing, and, like any progressive country, the death penalty has been eliminated from its legal system.
The economic situation of the people in the north, who, despite the consequences of the dissolution of their economic and political structures after the Soviet Union era, continue to rebuild their political and economic systems with a high spirit, contrasts sharply with the situation in the south, where unemployment is rampant, and the economy is in shambles.
A people with a shared cultural and historical legacy, one part of which lives in a free and independent country, proud and reliant on its identity, economic potential, culture, music, and native language, is recognized worldwide as a peaceful and humanitarian people, while their counterparts in the south, who live under the same Aryan and Zoroastrian land, are not only in miserable social and economic conditions, alongside other oppressed peoples of Iran, but are also deprived of even the most basic human rights, such as the right to use their native language and maintain their identity. They face the most degrading insults and are even compared to animals.
(Of course, it should be noted that in some instances, both the people of South and North Azerbaijan hold world records. People in the north are ranked first globally in economic growth, while the people in the south, along with the rest of the population living in this sacred and Aryan land, hold the world record for drug consumption.)
It should be expected that as time passes and the political and economic conditions of the people in northern Azerbaijan improve, and Turkey's integration into European politics and economics becomes more serious, Pan-Iranist racists will increasingly resort to falsifying history, repeating the Pahlavi-era myth of the Aryan nature of the Turks in Iran. Here, as the first president of the Islamic Republic once said regarding cooperation between Republicans and monarchists, “One does not eat their own vomit,” we can say that fascists and racists not only consume the poisons that the people of Azerbaijan raised during the 1979 revolution, but also lick the remnants of it.