Reza Baraheni - June 6, 2006
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni |
Some people have forgotten the question and demand its solution. Some want to change the question to present us with a faulty solution. Others ignore the question, its form, and the solution, and instead bring up other issues and propose their solutions. What tends to be forgotten, yet must not be, are two essential issues: one is a part of a whole, while the other is the whole itself, encompassing not only this part but other parts as well to form a complete entity. However, each part sometimes exists on its own, other times alongside others, interconnected with them, or even as a symbolic, individual representation of the collective whole.
One aspect is seeing Mana Neyestani as a cartoonist who created an anti-Turk caricature, and the other aspect is viewing him as a prisoner who, as Massoud Behnoud put it, “with his childlike face, his rare talent for drawing since childhood, and his vulnerability…sits alone in his prison cell, facing an uncertain fate.”
These two aspects of the issue are entirely unrelated. Those whom his cartoon turned into cockroaches had no power to imprison him. The newspaper that published his caricature is an official state newspaper, and the apparatus that jailed him belongs to the same system that owns the state newspaper. Both the newspaper and the judiciary system, as well as the prison, belong to a particular system known as the Islamic Republic. The newspaper is also in Farsi, the official language of the Islamic Republic, which had previously been the official language under the two Pahlavi monarchs. Should Mana Neyestani have been imprisoned? To make my subsequent points clear, I’ll say that if human rights governed Iran, if he had no private or public complainants, and if he had not been tried and convicted by a legitimate court, he should never have been imprisoned. His private or public complainants could have been me or, according to official statistics, the 37.4 percent of Iran’s population, namely the Azeri Turks of Azerbaijan and more than half the population of Tehran, as well as millions of Turkmen, Qashqais, and other Turkic-speaking people of Iran. Yet the reason he is in prison is not that the government opposes the use of “cockroach” to describe Azerbaijanis and Turks. The real reason is the government's fear of all the people of Iran, particularly Azerbaijanis. Thus, while it condemns them to the deprivation of identity, language, culture, and freedom of thought and expression in their native language, it also turns their defamer into a caricature of his own creation, throwing him, too, into prison as if he were a cockroach. Even worse, it also arrests and imprisons a large number of Azerbaijanis protesting the publication of that caricature and those words, and some of them are killed. Those who strongly opposed the content of Neyestani's caricature have faced worse fates. In all the cities, government forces attacked people, some were killed, and others languish in prison without clarity on their fates. The government still blames foreign instigations and claims that the United States is involved, as usual. If the United States indeed managed to infiltrate the official state newspaper, why then does it continue to threaten Iran day and night globally, a threat whose outcome would be horrendous atrocities, akin to those seen only in Vietnam and Iraq—if we disregard the hypothetical use of atomic bombing?
Another point regarding the part and the whole: how did it occur to Mana Neyestani to create a cockroach that speaks Turkish? Let’s discuss another caricature that, since I wrote the article “National Oppression in Iran,” has been sent to me multiple times via email. In this caricature, several donkeys are lined up one after the other, with slight differences, and beneath them are the names of the cities of Azerbaijan in sequence, leading to Tehran. The first donkey represents Ardabil, and from there, it gradually advances through Miandoab, Zanjan, and Qazvin before reaching Tehran. In Tehran, it slightly rises, seemingly achieving some form of evolution. This implies that Turks are donkeys who only become semi-donkeys, semi-humans upon reaching Tehran, but never turn into complete humans—Fars, in this context. This caricature was allegedly sent by a monarchist group. This reveals that, at least concerning the issue of Azerbaijan, the gap between future political contenders abroad and the Islamic Republic is minimal, and intriguingly, there isn’t much difference in this regard between literate and illiterate people. For example, Dr. Ehsan Yarshater, who publishes the Encyclopaedia Iranica, suggests in every conference that we should henceforth say Persia instead of Iran in English, as Westerners have historically called Iran Persia (making one wonder why he named his encyclopedia Iranica!). Ahmad Shamlou, in one of his poems, openly expresses his disdain for having the name Ahmad and the surname Shamlou, the former being Arabic and the latter Turkish. Dr. Jalal Matini, who opposes Ahmad Shamlou, exhibits such chauvinism that he deems all prominent Azerbaijanis traitors to Iran, and I’ll never forget that Nader Naderpour, when stumped by literary reasoning, formally called me a calabash tree in Ferdowsi Magazine forty years ago, sparking outrage even among writers abroad, such as Mohammad Assemi, who wondered aloud how long this racism would persist!
The atmosphere created against the people of Azerbaijan is deeply contaminated with racism, despite the fact that, according to international statistics (see Ethnologue.com online), the Azerbaijani population in Iran, comprising 37.3% of the total population, is even more than three percent of the Persian speakers in Iran. It is strange that this backwardness manifests itself at a time when similar societies are trying to open up spaces both theoretically and practically. Those who want to impose a kind of complete common identity on all nationalities in Iran are suffering from a form of primitivism. This primitivism did not start from the ancient era, as there was no awareness of it during that time. This particular form of primitivism, which is only about eighty years old, actually began with the Pahlavi era, seeking to promote the notion that there exists an eternal essence of Aryans, an essence that is Indo-European, which must, at all costs, assimilate the other ethnic and national groups into it. Politically, this ideology has been employed to eradicate the achievements of the Constitutional Revolution and to restore monarchy as a complete, pure, and comprehensive myth for governing the country. This obsession with an ancient essence, this sense of regression towards a seemingly inspiring center, has pushed Iran years back in its pursuit of the modern world. The rewriting of the initial national essence, even with the royal perspectives before the Constitutional Revolution, was different. The truth is that Iran's history has been continuous, but at the forefront of this history, more than any ethnicity or dynasty, the Turks and Turkish dynasties have ruled over Iran. And this very ethnic group has spared no effort in reviving and elevating the Persian language. If the Turkish kings had not supported the Persian language and literature, there might not have been anything called Persian language and literature today, and if they had imposed their mother tongue across the country over which they ruled, we might have been dealing with the Turkish language and literature today. Furthermore, writing in a language at a time when formal education and printing and publishing in that language or another language did not exist turns the issue of writing into something private. If formal education and printing had existed, we would not have been in search of the almost rare manuscripts of past books.
The betrayal of the majority of the people occurred at a time when public education in the country, which had initially started in two languages before Reza Khan's reign, was transformed into education in Persian upon his arrival. Owners of other languages and cultures were ordered to relinquish their rights and original identities through a royal decree, and all had to submit to one of the languages: namely Persian. Through the Persian language, which is an Indo-European language, gradually, this sense was instilled in all the people of the country except for the Persians, that they must forget their mother tongue and native language upon entering school. This mental rift separated families from the children who went to school, especially from mothers, and this incident led to the emergence of dual personalities in every individual from the oppressed nationalities of Iran. More than sixty-seven percent of the country's children were made to feel that their mother tongue was a language of humiliation, while the ruling language was a glorious one that everyone should learn and take pride in. It is no wonder that unconsciously Mr. Mana Nistanian has equated the cockroach and the mother of Azerbaijanis as being of the same kind. It would have been enough for Mr. Nistanian to gain a little familiarity with the authenticity of both languages and place the meaning of the word “nemeneh” against the Persian phrase “what does it mean” to understand that the Turkish word, if not more beautiful, is at least as beautiful as those two Persian words that convey the meaning of a Turkish word. The contempt for something beautiful occurs solely because, over the past eighty years, two different governments have beaten into him that Turkish is an ugly language, and Persian is a beautiful language. While languages are neither ugly nor beautiful in themselves, they are infused with the individual and collective psyche of the people who speak them. Additionally, it must be added that this mentality, especially the mentality of an artist, should include the breadth and power to perceive beauty in foreign things and phenomena. The beauty in the foreign element should be noticed more quickly than in the familiar element, because the foreign element is inherently engulfed in strangeness, and strangeness is not always, but often in many cases, more attractive and beautiful than the familiar phenomenon. Anyone who cannot perceive the beauty of the foreign phenomenon has, in fact, become alienated from themselves. And this awareness should drown Mana Nistanian in emptiness because he has called into question his aesthetics education, and in reality, by failing to perceive the beauty of two “no's” on either side of a “meh,” he has directed the insult back at himself. This reflects a double alienation of an artist polluted by the ruling racist regime, who has turned his back on the auditory beauty of that language once and has again diminished it to the level of the utterance of a cockroach due to his lack of understanding. It was supposed that the cockroach would not understand beauty, but now we see that someone who does not comprehend the beauty of two open nun letters between an open meem—regardless of the language (Persian, Turkish, Arabic, English)—has, in fact, reduced his own esteemed self to the status of a cockroach: “I am not the only one; I have made the Kaaba of my heart a temple.” Well, “nemeneh” has been repeated in a verse of Hafez; is it ugly? “I am not the only one; I have made the Kaaba of my heart a temple—there is a monastery at every step, and there is a church.” Is this “nemeneh” in Hafez's language also the language of a cockroach? Or has the oppression reigning over our relationships created forgetfulness in us? We have forgotten that beauty can sometimes be found in things that oppression has fundamentally burned and decayed. Mana Nistanian, who should have been a more worthy child of my late friend Manouchehr Nistanian, even if he becomes free before this note is published, should remain disturbed in his oblivious conscience, questioning why he did not bite back. The insult to nearly thirty million of his compatriots has come at a heavy price. The rightful protest against his inappropriate work has been met with beatings, imprisonment, murder, and crime across all cities in Azerbaijan and even in Tehran. A nation tears its throat out for questioning why an official newspaper has called it a cockroach, and the government dispatches agents from other regions to the cities of Azerbaijan to beat and kill those who refuse to accept their identity as cockroaches!
Does Azerbaijan accept humiliation? Does acceptance or rejection even have meaning for Azerbaijan? The issue goes beyond that. Azerbaijani self-confidence may lie elsewhere. In the Tobacco Movement, a fatwa was issued by Mirza Shirazi. At that time, Azerbaijan did not cultivate tobacco, but one dog in the history of minds is more embedded than any other dog. When the king who sold the tobacco concession sent his envoy to impose his decision on Tabriz, the people placed a collar around the neck of a dog and called it the king's envoy. If the people of Tabriz were only concerned about their own race and ethnicity, they would have been expected to obey and defend the Turk king. The opposition of the people of Tabriz to the tobacco concession even led the English consul to conclude that the concession had failed. Was the Constitutional Revolution possible without Azerbaijan, without the revolution of the people of Azerbaijan, which at that time was referred to as "the nation of Azerbaijan" in the existing documents, letters, and telegrams? Would the hero of that revolution, i.e., Sattar Khan, have been martyred in that lamentation due to treachery and deception if he had not gone to Tehran? Was Haydar Khan Amuqli not killed in support of Mirza Kuchak Khan? Was Colonel Pessian, the great son of Azerbaijan, not killed as a result of the treachery of Qavam al-Saltanah and Reza Khan? Did Seyyed Jafar Pishevari, the sharpest political figure in Azerbaijan, not spend more time in the prisons of Reza Shah than any other political figure? Was he not the one who, after the departure of Reza Shah, actually sought only to be the representative of Tabriz in the National Assembly? And did those parliamentarians not deceive him? Was he not the one who, upon returning to Tabriz, held the first congress of the national Azerbaijan to realize the provincial councils? Was he not the one who first granted women equal rights with men? Was he not the one who, in just one year, saved such a large province from the scourge of lumpens, thugs, highwaymen, freeloaders, bullies, and land grabbers with empty hands? Was he not the one who concretely implemented the Constitutional Revolution in Azerbaijan? Was he not the father of all the children of Tabriz, a friend of all workers and peasants, and responsible for the health and security of such a large area? And were it not for Qavam and Stalin, who joined hands to crush democracy in Azerbaijan and extinguish hope and aspiration among the people of the region, that the first revolutionary movement of workers and peasants would have been thwarted? The Turkish language became the official language of Azerbaijan because it was its official language. It was previously potential, and Pishevari turned it into action, so that after the fall of the party, there would be neither power nor action! Was he not the one who asphalted the second largest city in the country, i.e., Tabriz, at night? Was he not the one who established the second university in the country? Was he not the one who roamed among the people and feared no one? And was he not the one who punished only criminals and aggressors against the children and women of the people? Was he not the one who officially promoted theater, music, and literature in the region? Do you not feel ashamed to call a man who has served so much a traitor? Do you not have Stalin's letter reproaching him in front of your eyes? And do you not notice at all that he never wanted to leave Iran? As Professor Zahabi said, he was taken in a closed car across the border, and then brutally killed, solely because he raised his glass of wine to the health of the Azerbaijani who would remain within the borders of Iran at a banquet with Qaravuf.
The greatest characteristic of the monarchy of both Pahlavis was their opposition to Azerbaijan. According to Jalal Al-Ahmad, they made Azerbaijan a colony of Tehran. According to Sadegh Hedayat, they created issues in the south and among the Qashqai to crush Tabriz during Pishevari's era. When we were forced to burn textbooks that were in our mother tongue in the square of the municipality, the flames rising reached the feet of the men who were hanged above us. The Fedayi, who kept watch during the day and asphalted the streets of Tabriz at night, were pulled from their homes after the fall of the Democratic Party, right before our eyes as children of that time, and they were told to move on, not to look back, and then shot right in front of us, and their bodies were thrown into the gutter or beside the gutter as they dragged them away. With which city's people in Iran, other than those in Azerbaijan, has this deal been made? The truth is that I got used to turning around and looking behind me while walking since childhood.
After these atrocities, the teachings of Dr. Mahmoud Afshar, who encouraged the illiterate Reza Khan to formalize the Persian language for the entire country, turned to Reza Khan's son, who refused to publish the poetry of his Turk mother and banned the teaching of his mother tongue in Azerbaijan. Anyone who betrays their mother and their mother tongue will, in a more fundamental way, betray everyone else. Strangely, since that day until today, it seems that the world has not changed. Even after sixty-one years, after all these movements around the world, after all these revolutions and counter-revolutions and coups and counter-coups, after the emergence of dozens of different countries around the world, after all this freedom that many people have gained everywhere, the nation of Azerbaijan still does not have the right to sit at a table and study and read books in the language of Reza Shah Pahlavi’s wife, the language of his mother and the language of the third wife of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and the language of the current leader of the Islamic Republic. This language is my mother tongue and the mother tongue of thirty million people in the country. The issue is this: an Azerbaijani must have the right to write, read, study, and teach in their mother tongue. Azerbaijan also has the right to have its own identity. An Azerbaijani must manage their region wisely and in their own language. Otherwise, an Azerbaijani is not your compatriot. They are a colony of Persian-speaking regions. They are a colony of Isfahan, Shiraz, and the Persian half of Tehran. This is a struggle, a struggle. An Azerbaijani says: "Remove culture from the absolute dominance of the owners of one language." We want cultural, linguistic, and administrative equality. It is only the deprivation of this equality from the people of Azerbaijan that will make them rebel against the oppressors whenever they get the chance. Only democratic equality among all nationalities and ethnicities in the country guarantees the survival of a country called Iran. You can either lose Iran or have a collection of people who live in Iran, in their homes, enjoying equal rights until the end of history. A country called Iran has not been an indivisible, single absolute essence since the beginning of prehistory and history. Throughout, groups, ethnicities, nations, and owners of different languages and cultures have lived there. Attributing a single absolute essence to it is an impossible, Utopian fantasy, a notion in nowhere, and a nostalgia for a single nation with a single language does not match its reality. No matter how much dreamers try to elevate themselves from the earth and wander in the skies, seeking to create a single, unified nation out of thousands of fabrications, bloodshed, and abduction, moving police and gendarmes from place to place, and disturbing the sleep of innocent people with all kinds of treachery and deception, they cannot root out the essence of these diverse peoples and forge them into a singular, homogeneous, single-language, single-culture nation! Iran can be a United States of Iran, a Union of Iranian Republics, a collection of commonwealth nations with different languages, with one or two common languages among all, because reality demands that this is how it should be, and no other way. Governments that have moved against this reality have only engaged in bloodshed against the people and bloodsucking for themselves. We saw how the Shah's dream turned into a nightmare when, a few years before his downfall, he stood in an oasis surrounded by hundreds of miles of desert, before half of the bewildered leaders of the countries of that time, performing those ridiculous plays in the clumsiest manner possible. There was no more laughable performance than this catastrophic essentialism that, after the end of its extravagance, was supposed to turn its Khums, Zakat, and donations into the disgraceful team for the market of the bankrupt television in Los Angeles, and on the other side, the seemingly reformist but entirely essentialist and archaic speech of an old man who, addressing Iranians, each of whom belongs to an ethnic group in the country, says, "Do not say Iran, but say Persia." This means that despite the oppression of bloodthirsty men who have always drawn their swords and commanded death with foaming mouths—both past and present—one cannot explain the secret of the endurance of various ethnicities living side by side in a vast land by simply changing one word, nor can one delay the emergence of "brave hearts, the bold, and the elite" by trying to implant that word "in the minds of the naive who have not yet known the joys of love." Just as a nation stood up against the insult of a caricature, despite all the apparent kindness toward it, and the massacre of its children at the hands of agents brought in from other provinces and regions, because an Azerbaijani agent could neither nor want to bash down the doors of every writer, journalist, and eminent person's home in Azerbaijan, nor beat a number of men in front of their wives and children and then send them off to prisons and their own lost dungeons in other regions, nor hand over Azerbaijani writers and poets to their ruthless abductors.
Of course, there are those who, after witnessing these calamities, inject separatism. Who has ever said that Iran belongs to someone else for you to separate from it? The largest Azerbaijani city in the world is Tehran, which has more than half of the total population of this capital, surrounded by Azerbaijani cities, the largest of which is the multi-million population city of Karaj. If we are realistic, we must say that Tehran and its surroundings, despite having millions of Persian speakers, are, after Istanbul and its surroundings, the largest Turkic city in the world. My birthplace, Tabriz, which contemporary archaeologists have proven brought the legendary "Garden of Eden" to antiquity, has a population of about half that of the Turks in Tehran, yet it is still symbolically considered "the capital of the Turks of Iran." The insult of the caricature of Iran showed that the Azerbaijani Turks are scattered throughout Iran and regard every corner of Iran as their homeland, even though there are a number of racists among the Persian speakers who view them as foreigners. The Turks of Iran have reigned over Iran for nearly a thousand years. All three major fields of Persian poetry, philosophy, mysticism, and prose—namely the Khorasan area, the Azerbaijan area (which refers to all of Azerbaijan, both what has separated and is called Northern Azerbaijan, and the Azerbaijan of Iran), and the Shiraz and Isfahan area, as well as Central Iran—continued their work uninterrupted during the reign of the Turks. Additionally, the Turks of Iran have played the largest role in establishing Shia Islam in Iran. They saved Iran from the grip of the Ottoman Turks. The Turks of Iran did not only bring constitutionalism to Iran. The modern civilization entered Iran mainly through Azerbaijan. The first theater and performance, the first serious translation, the first critical and realistic novels, the first political and satirical poetry, the first literary criticism, and above all, the practical conception of a social and historical revolution. The purpose of listing these is not to boast, but to demonstrate the degree and extent of participation in constructing everything that is recognized as the history of a country. This collective memory is of a collection of people, nationalities, and nations that have stood together, intertwined, and fought alongside each other. This collective consciousness and unconsciousness can never be considered void or thrown out through the windows of random events. Both Sattar Khan and Sheikh Mohammad Khiyabani, as well as Seyyed Jafar Pishevari, were fully aware of this matter. The intelligence and civil, political, and social knowledge of Pishevari were significantly greater than those of the other two. It was no joke: the largest province of the country, which had endured the humiliations of figures like Mostofi, Reza Khan, and the entourage of Mohammad Reza, managed to administer and organize the lives of the people without receiving any help from the center, bestowing upon them the identity and pride of being human.
This is why it is essential to understand the meaning of the existence and defeat of the Democratic Party within the framework of revolutionary movements of that era across Asia, especially Iran. In fact, there should be a serious connection between the 1905 Russian Revolution, the Constitutional Revolution, which occurred two or three years later, the Bolshevik Revolution, and the movement of the Democratic Party and the Chinese Revolution, as this connection indeed exists. All these revolutions were against the internal rulers of Russia, Iran, and China, as well as against the growing imperialism across the world. The difference is that the Democratic Party emerged precisely at the end of World War II, and to destroy that nascent Iranian bourgeoisie, global imperialism and Stalinism joined forces. Stalin abandoned Pishevari, tempted by the oil of the North; the Tudeh Party compromised with Qavam os-Saltaneh, and the pressure from the United States and Britain increased daily on all involved. Azerbaijan suffered one of its largest massacres in history at the hands of the agents of Mohammad Reza Shah. Had the Democratic Party not failed in Azerbaijan and Qazi Muhammad in Kurdistan, undoubtedly, the movement that had begun among oil workers would not have faced defeat, and later, following the nationalization of oil under the leadership of Dr. Mossadegh, the coup of August 19 would not have redirected nationalized oil back to the oil cartels, and the Shah, who had left, would not have returned, and Iran would not have borne the disgrace of the August 19 coup as a humiliating national loss.
I have previously pointed out that there is a very important structural difference between the promotion of enlightenment and religious propaganda in Iran. The language of the clergy was oral, and for this reason, it was in the mother tongue of the people. Despite the diversity of mother tongues, the Shah's government never prohibited religious promotion in the language of the religious propagandist, which was always the language of the audience. Throughout my life in Iran, I never saw a cleric in Tabriz who spoke Persian. They did not know how to speak Persian, and there was no need, as the audience did not understand Persian either. The same was true in other provinces and cities of Iran. In Tehran, when I first heard a eulogy in Persian, instead of feeling sad, I found it amusing. I thought that eulogies could only be recited in Turkish. These matters required direct communication, but no intellectual had a direct relationship with the people. Communication occurred through books and newspapers, and sometimes through radio. However, only Persian speakers or those who were educated understood the radio. In 1952, in the “Rasteh Koocheh” of Tabriz, while sitting in a coffee house, I became the translator of Mossadegh's speeches for the coffee house patrons. The books were read by those who could read, and all the books were in Persian. We only saw everything in Turkish for one year, and that was during the Democratic Party era. For this reason, my generation only learned Turkish orally. It was only later that one might have the opportunity to learn Turkish in written form. Or not learn it at all. I experienced Persian first, then Arabic, and then English in written form. My experience with Turkish was only for one year. After I entered university, I also studied French. I learned written Turkish later, and mostly after obtaining my doctorate, we were made to believe that Turkish was only for uneducated people. This was entirely true, as we spoke Turkish at home with our father, mother, grandmother, aunt, and other children, but no one was literate, meaning they were not literate in Turkish. When they said that my brother or I were literate, they meant that we could read books in Persian. For this reason, my father thought that if Turkish was spoken politely, it would become Persian. In his mind, Persian speakers were superior to us, and if a person became polite, they transformed into someone better than us.
The reason the mosques were busy was that the clergy spoke to the people in their language. I had rarely seen a Persian cleric in Tabriz. All the clerics were Turkish and spoke Turkish. However, at school, they told us that if we spoke Turkish, we would be penalized. Therefore, we generally remained silent and just looked at each other. I am explaining this colonial system. When I obtained my bachelor's degree in Tabriz, I had dealt with four foreign languages—Persian, Arabic, English, and French—in written form, and I was very proficient in two of them, Persian and English. Yet, I still did not have a command of the written form of my mother tongue. No one had taught me. Linguistically, I had been fragmented into five parts. Later, I transformed this painful process into a kind of success. That is why I have never forgotten the agony I endured. This agony was what Reza Khan imposed on us. A poorly educated man, who himself did not properly understand Persian, imposed one language on the entire country, influenced by a few Turks who had become overly enthusiastic about Persian, such as Dr. Mahmoud Afshar. Reza Khan was indeed a peculiar man. He had issued a decree to unveil women. Very well. Just a few years ago, I read somewhere that when he sent his women and daughters unveiled among men, he couldn't sleep at night and was furious. This colonialism imposed a very complicated, confusing, and foolish situation on everyone, from the Shah himself down to the lowest levels. Instead of my mother tongue, I had learned four foreign languages. Reza Shah's wife had written poetry in Turkish, which is my mother tongue; and her husband, Reza Shah, and later his son, Mohammad Reza Shah, did not allow her and their mother to publish their poems. Reza Shah could not sleep after the unveiling when he saw the faces of his women and daughters in the presence of his cabinet ministers, who presumably could not sleep either, having seen their wives and daughters in front of Reza Shah. You see how modernity sought to enter Iran through such a keyhole. Of course, Reza Shah firmly believed that Turks would become human only when they learned Persian, and Mohammad Reza Shah, whose mother was Turkish, even spoke Persian with Sa'id Maraghei, who spoke Persian very poorly. It was unclear why they made the situation so difficult. It was as if learning Persian automatically made one a supporter of the Shah. You see how, here, the problem is mixed up with its solution, as well as the forms with the forms and the solutions with the solutions.
The bell of the revolution of February 22 sounded a year earlier on Bahman 29 in Tabriz. The Iranian revolution has always been a composite revolution. Just as Tabriz was at the forefront of the Tobacco Movement, the Constitutional Movement, and the Democratic Party movement, it quickly aligned itself with the movements that began elsewhere and echoed the call of the February 22 revolution with Bahman 29 in Tabriz. The first government agent was killed on Bahman 29 in Tabriz. The then Prime Minister said that a group from across the border had come and committed such a treacherous act. For the first time after the fall of the Democratic Party, Turkish slogans reached the ears of the people. Subsequently, other mourning ceremonies were held across the country. The revolution took on a cyclical rhythm over a specific period. If it weren't for Bahman 29 in Tabriz, there would have been no Bahman 22 in 57. I do not write these words to clarify events; rather, I write them to show that this serious movement is neither abrupt nor unpreceded. Azerbaijan is an inseparable part of the history of the revolution. At all times on Bahman 29 in Tabriz, the slogans were often in Turkish, and this was the first time this had happened. This means that Azerbaijan was making its independent voice heard. My aim is to clarify the relationship whereby similar movements, in a formal sense, suddenly transform into different movements in reality. It seems that each revolutionary movement presents its own dialectic, and until that dialectic is presented, we cannot speak of it. However, this time the matter has been revealed over the past month. One has spoken Turkish. The bug has spoken. As Forough Farrokhzad said, “And the bug, oh the bug! When the bug speaks.” Suddenly, what was supposed to be a bug has transformed into the voices of millions, resonating in all cities of Azerbaijan, and in all Turkish-speaking areas of the country, including Tehran. It seems that no Turk has remained at home anywhere in Iran in the past few weeks. Again, the government has taken action, claiming external provocations, just like on Bahman 29. Any action against oppression is said to have been incited by foreigners. The only thing that is not incited by foreigners is oppression, murder, slaughter, bringing forces from one city to the cities of Azerbaijan, taking revenge on men in front of their wives and children, and arresting all cultural leaders of Azerbaijan. After all, this movement is entirely democratic. It is no joke. The most populous nationality in the country has been reduced to a bug, and from its voice, they have spoken nonsense about the ignorance and stupidity of that nationality. And now, the voices of the stormy people have shaken all the cities: “Oh Lord, how brave these Turkish children are, who at every moment catch prey with the dart of their eyelashes.” Hey, that poor bug was only referring to you, why are you making a “tribal outcry”? This “tribal outcry” has been attributed to a group that is preparing for a leftist revolution—because the water is too cold to perform ablution—directed at Azerbaijan. But Azerbaijanis are protesting with all their might. What patience they have! The patience of Job! And suddenly: “I saw in a pleasant dream that a cup was in my hand—interpretation passed and the matter was in the hands of the government. Thirty years of suffering and sorrow we endured, and finally—our strategy was in hand—the wine was two years old.” It seems that Hafez observed the scene and wrote the poem. Well, what will happen now?
We do not exactly know what will happen. Azerbaijan wants exactly what it has always wanted: democratic rights, the freedom to study from kindergarten to university in the mother tongue, the establishment of provincial and district councils in a democratic manner, the official recognition of the Turkish language everywhere in Iran where Turks live, the allocation of overdue budgets and appropriate funding to meet shortages, and the transfer of internal governance of Azerbaijan—all regions of Azerbaijan, according to historical documents, not according to recent arbitrary historical divisions, to the people of Azerbaijan themselves. These are the things that all Azerbaijanis have demanded. But those who have a hand in the fire from afar cannot determine the fate of Azerbaijan. Modernity cannot be implemented through the translation of books. Modernity means modern communication in a new form in all efficient and contemporary units, the freedom of the ethnic leaders of Azerbaijan, and sitting with them to secure the social and historical rights of Azerbaijan, ensuring and enhancing the economy of Azerbaijan. In short, transferring the internal administration of Azerbaijan to the hands of Azerbaijanis themselves. And this is not feasible unless you do the same for all nationalities in Iran. The people of Iran have no choice but to manage their affairs federatively.
Let us all adjust our clocks to this historical moment, for tomorrow there may be neither hour nor date. Let us put aside our biases and sit under one roof to solve the problem. Let us entrust the work to those who possess the wisdom to resolve the issue and are neither traitors nor servants of foreigners. Despite our differences, let us have the courage to love one another.
Link to the original text in Farsi: https://asre-nou.net/1385/khordad/20/m-barahani.html