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| During the ascent to Babek Castle — Kaleybar, East Azerbaijan, July 2002 From right: Alireza Sarrafi, editor-in-chief of the banned journal Dilmanc; Yousef Azizi Benitorof. |
On the way to Babek Castle in Kaleybar, East Azerbaijan, July 1, 2002. Alireza Sarrafi and I joined crowds of Azerbaijani Turks climbing the mountainside, determined to affirm their national identity.
It was late afternoon when we departed Tehran by bus for Kaleybar. Everyone was Turkish except my son Afnan and me. Yet we were not strangers within that gathering, because we shared the same spirit and purpose. Along the way, one person played the tar, another sang, and a third performed a Turkish dance. Poetry, happiness, and music continued until morning. The same festivities continued on the second night, this time at the foot of the castle.
I will never forget the sorrowful expression on Hasan Rashedi’s face during that journey. I saw him beside the bus in Tehran and learned that the Ministry of Intelligence had prevented him from travelling to the castle.
Throughout the ascent to the castle, agents of the Ministry of Intelligence followed us step by step. From time to time, they summoned Akbar Azad, attempting to turn the sweetness of the journey bitter for him and for all of us. Yet that sweetness remains alive in my heart and soul.
After participating in that enormous gathering and returning to Tehran, I wrote an article for Qatar’s Al-Sharq newspaper titled “Yaşasın Azərbaycan” (“Long Live Azerbaijan”). I asked the newspaper’s Arab editor-in-chief to publish the article under that same title.
Some time later, the newspaper Resalat wrote on its front page: “Pan-Turk, Pan-Arab—congratulations on your alliance.” The National Front’s website also attacked me, asking: “What business did you, an Arab, have there?”
Later, during an interrogation, the same criticism was directed at me. In response, I asked: “Are Turks not Iranians and my compatriots?” The agent, claiming merely to be following orders, replied: “Then why do you not make friends with people from Isfahan?” I answered: “I also have friends from Isfahan.” But all of this was merely a pretext for fabricating a case against me.
I believed then, and I still believe, that nothing can undermine the solidarity of our oppressed peoples—not the Ministry of Intelligence, not the National Front, and not Tehran’s yellow press.
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