Alirza Quluncu, Voice of America, March 13, 2023
Recently, many families in Iranian Azerbaijan, who have been unable to obtain an identity card for their children with a Turkish name, have started to appeal to the courts.
Recently, the court in Tabriz upheld the complaint of the Allahverdipur family, who were unable to obtain an identity card for their daughter, Elana.
The family had applied to the Iranian Civil Registration Office in Tabriz and the East Azerbaijan Provincial Directorate to obtain an identity card for their daughter, born in December. However, the registration office refused to register the name "Elana," claiming that it was "inappropriate and considered a prohibited name and not suitable for a female."
The child's father, Hamid Allahverdipur, appealed to the general court of Tabriz in January, requesting that his daughter be issued an identity card with the name they had chosen, and also demanded that the court costs be covered by the registration office.
According to a decision shared by human rights lawyer Sina Yousefi on his Twitter page, the court ruled that an identity card should be issued for the name "Elana" and that the registration office and the provincial directorate should cover the court costs. The registration office, however, appealed the decision to the provincial appellate court.
The East Azerbaijan Provincial Appellate Court upheld the initial decision on issuing the identity card last week but accepted the registration office's appeal regarding the court costs, meaning the Allahverdipur family will have to pay the court fees themselves.
Civil registration offices in Iran often refuse to issue identity cards for Turkish names chosen by families, citing that these names are generally not of Iranian or Islamic origin, are foreign, or not on the list of approved names.
Farhad Javadi, the author of the "Turkish Human Names" dictionary published in Iran in 2001, had previously stated in an interview with Voice of America that the situation was even more difficult in the 1990s.
"I tell those who want to give their child or business a Turkish name that no preventive law has been written about names. However, they (state authorities) are instructed to do whatever they can to prevent the use of Turkish names. They create a situation where people go back and forth for days, and then they get tired and give up, saying, ‘Whatever name it is,’" Javadi had said in the interview.
Link to the original text in Turkish on the Azerbaijani section of Voice of America:
Şərqi Azərbaycan məhkəməsi 'Elana' adlı uşağa şəxsiyyət vəsiqəsi verilməsinə dair hökm çıxarıb