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Kurds’ Autonomy Cries Rekindle Ethnic Flashpoint in Iran

          
          Kurds' Autonomy Cries Rekindle Ethnic Flashpoint in Iran: Kurds' Autonomy Cries Rekindle Ethnic F...
          By Jon ath an C. R.an dal. Wash i.n gton Post F orei.gn Servi.ce
          The W ashington Post (1974 Currentfii ); Mar 2, 1979;
          ProQu.est Histori.cal Newspapers: The Washin.gton Post (1. 877 1994)
          pg A13
          Kurds'
          By Jonathan C. Randal
          Washin L n Pcst Foreign Service
          MAHABAD, Iran, March 1- The
          single-story elementary school here
          houses the nearest thing to sc1f gov-
          ernment that Iran's traditionally na-
          tionalistic Kurds have known for
          more than 30 years. With the collapse
          of the centralizing and ethnically re-
          pressive Pahiavi rule, and with the
          weak Tehran revolutionary govern-
          rhent's writ far from universally re-
          spected, the Kurds in western Iran
          are pressing their claims for auton-
          omy with new vigor.
          “Democracy for Iran, autonomy for
          Kurdistan” is their slogan, A federal
          Iran is their professed goal. Threat of
          armed secessionist uprising is their of-
          ficially discouraged but nonetheless
          real threat if negotiations with Teh-
          ran fail,
          However commonplace that combi-
          nation may appear, in Middle East
          terms it is a potential prescription for
          long-term violence and fighting that
          could tear apart Iran, Iraq, Turkey,
          Pakistan and involve the Soviet Union
          and perhaps the West. At stake are
          not just the ethnically artificial bor-
          ders of these states, but policy deci-
          sions for the Soviets and the West if
          fighting in Iranian Kurdistan kindled
          wider violence.
          When Shah Moham mad Reza Pah-
          lavi was still in power, the Kurds'
          separatist yearnings were a constant
          nightmare. For Iran's minorities—
          Arabs, Azerbaijanis, Turkomans and
          Baluchis as well as the Kurds—proba-
          bly come close to equaling the Per-
          sian-speaking population of the
          Iranian heartland.
          Iran's Arabs wei-e the original i.nliab-
          itants of Khuzestan, the center of the
          oil industry bordering on Iraq and
          long claimed by the Baghdad govern-
          ment. Azerhaijanis, ethnic Turks in
          northern Iran, also have grievances,
          especially demands for cultural auton-
          omy.
          Iranian Baluchistan, in the south-
          east, borders on a similarly named
          province of Pakistan, where secession-
          isis have long threatened the wobb.ly
          central government of Mohammed Zia
          u l-Haq.
          The perhaps 16 million Kurds—
          spread out in unequal, but descending
          order in contiguous communities in
          Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Syria and the So-
          viet Union—have a history of fighting,
          -losing and fighting again for their
          freedom, Iran's 2 million Kurcis are
          no exception,
          Thirty three years ago, this city of
          60,000 Inhabitants was the capital of
          the so-called Mahabad Republic, an
          ill-fated, Soviet-backed seccessionist
          state crushed by the young shah's
          army after just 11 months.
          Mulla Mustafa Barzãni, now over 80
          and living in exile in the United
          States, made his first major appear-
          ance in that endeavor. The swash-
          buckling Kurdish leader dominated
          two more serious but eventually
          disastrous secessionist efforts—guer-
          rilla wars against Iraq's governments
          from 1950 to 1965 and then again
          f.rom 1970 to 1975.
          But given Iran's troubles, almost as
          inevitable as Kurdish men's baggy
          trousers, the women's bright dresses
          and the spectacular mountain scen-
          ery has been the Kurds' inclination to
          try their luck again.
          Once again, Mahabad is the political
          center of Iranian Kurdistan, the only
          area in the country not controlled by
          Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's other
          wise all-pervasive committees-
          Except in the city of Kermanshah in
          southern urdistan, Kurdish national-
          ists are running their own show politi-
          eallyThey have flexed their muscles
          enough to: have taken over the local
          brigade-sized army camp, threatened
          three others nearer the Iraqi border
          and effectively prevented the army
          command from sending in reinforce-
          m ents.
          it was the takeover of the Mahabad
          garrison early last week — and the
          wounding of its commanding general,
          I hsan Pezeshpour—that prompted
          Khomeini and his government to dis-
          patch Labor Minister Dariush Forou-
          bar at the h . ad of.a mission to investi-
          gate the situation.
          The envoys were confronted with a
          hastily chosen delegation representing
          all Kurdish towns. It swore that separ
          atism was taboo but noted that the
          government mission had not been in-
          vited into its territory.
          Mostl.y members of the long-banned
          Kurdisli Democratic Party, the nation-
          alists presented Forouhar with an
          eight-point programS that pledged sup-
          port for Khomeini's revolution, but
          otherwise was a list of demands in-
          volving the Kurds' “basic rights,”
          They demanded Kurdish “self-deter-
          min tion within the framework” of
          Iran, joint control of military installa-
          tions in Kurdistan, a government boy-
          cott of the remnants of Barzani's ill-
          fated organization and sole represent-
          ation in any negotiations for Sheik Ez-
          zedine Hosseini,
          It was Hosseini who negotiated with
          the Forouhar mission that stayed here
          two days early last week, ft listened,
          pleaded that the government had
          higher priorities, promised redress on
          some points, but basically stalled.
          The tougher demands—especially
          self-determination—would be dis-
          cussed, Forouhar has said, by the con-
          sti.tuent assembly. That assembly,
          which is to appi-ove a new constitm
          tion, is not expected to meet for sev-
          eral months,
          The nationali ts are in a hurry to
          extract maximum concessions now.
          Hosseini, a clergyman of the Sunni
          sect of Islam, which most Kurcis pro-
          fess, said he hopes informal contacts
          with Tehran will prove fruitful and 1-
          low him to head a large delegation to
          negotiate soon with the goveimment
          or Khomeini himself.
          “%%TC are not separatists,” the 57-
          year-old bearded cleric said in his
          school headquarters. “But the Balu-
          chis, Arabs, Azerbaijanis and Kurcis
          aIl want a certain autonomy,”
          In .Kurdish nationalist terms a fed-
          eration, possibly along /Vest German,
          Swiss, Yugoslav or American lines,
          See KiJR .DS, A14, Ccl. 2
          By Dove Cook—The Washington Poob
        
          
          Kurds' Autonomy Cries Rekindle Ethnic Flashpoint
          KURDS, From A13
          would empower the central govern-
          ment to handle defense, banking, all
          but lo.cal taxes and big economic proj-
          ects. Local Kurdish authorities would
          be responsible for schools, the now
          suppressed teaching of the Kurdish
          language and cultural life.
          But as Abdul Rahman Ghassexnlou,
          a leftist nationalist who has recently
          returned from 20 years of exile in
          Czechoslovakia and France, put it: “It
          is important for us not only to have
          Kurdish schools and economic devel-
          opment, but most important, Kurdish
          people must feel they govern them-
          selves.”
          Hosseini, however, expressed doubt
          that the government would agree to
          federate. -
          Reflecting the nationalists' desire to
          avoid being tarred with the separatist
          brush, Hosseini, Ghasseinlou and
          other officials denied contacts with
          other minorities in Iran or with Kurds
          in Iraq and Turkey.
          Young Kurdish nationalists, how-
          ever, openly offered to take visiting
          newsmen across the snow-covered
          Ghandil Mountains into nearby Iraq
          to meet with leftist leader Jalal
          Talabani, an Iraqi Kurd said to head
          as many as 3,000 soldiers.
          And Hosselni acknowledged, “We
          support any revolutionary movement
          in Kurdistan or anywhere else.” He
          dismissed Iraq's program for cultural
          autonomy for Kurds as ‘verbal prom-
          ises.”
          The Mahabad leadership is deter-
          mined to flatter the Tehran govern-
          ment into being generous and thus it
          shies away from any open advocacy of
          armed struggle. If the Tehran authori-
          ties reject the Kurd's demands, 1-los-
          semi said, “We will find some other
          way to obtain our rights with the
          other peoples of Iran.”
          “As far as possible we will not take
          up arms,” he said. “We will seek
          peaceful means.”
          Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
        

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