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| Nahid Jafari |
University lecturer Nahid Jafari recently organized an online conference titled "Women, Life, Freedom: A Multinational Perspective of the Oppressed in Iran" as part of the Artists and Speakers Program at the State University of New York.
"In our society, especially we feminists faced a lot of opposition. It didn't matter, both women and men refused to accept that there were discriminations against women. They denied it. But, I think after the protests, now they can no longer deny it. Society has now accepted that these discriminations exist. There is no longer room for denial... I think this was a great victory for us women," said Nahid Jafari, reflecting on the recent protests in Iran.
Jafari's online conference at the State University of New York discussed the struggles faced by various ethnic and religious communities in Iran and their roles in the recent government protests.
The conference featured speakers including Swedish MP Aylin Fazilian and language rights activist Vahid Qarabaghi from the Turkish community; political analyst Mehdi Jalali Tehrani and human rights defender Nahid Farhad from the Persian community; women's rights activist Mona Silavi from the Arab community; lawyer Tara Azizi from the Kurdish community; and academic Azim Shirani from the Baloch community.
Jafari stated that there is a need for discussions in English regarding the issues faced by all groups within Iran in relation to the protests.
"Conferences about the protests, which are even held in America, are usually not in English, but in Persian. I thought that our voices should also be heard in English so that people in other countries are aware of the issue. On the other hand, many of the conferences held here in America or Europe often have an Iran-centered perspective. They organize these conferences to say, 'We are all Iranians, we all speak Persian, and discrimination affects all of us in the same way.' For example, they ignore non-Persian nations and turn a blind eye to their issues. They claim that everyone's problem is the same, and that we all have the same opposition to the Islamic Republic. But that's not true. Every nation has its own concerns and struggles that need to be heard. That's why I wanted to make sure that, even briefly, the voices of the nations suffering under oppression in Iran were heard," Nahid Jafari added.
Link to the original interview in Turkish on the Azerbaijani section of Voice of America:
Nahid Cəfəri: İranda zülm altında olan millətlərin dərdlərini danışmaq üçün konfrans təşkil etdik