Turkmen Uprising in Iran(the real reason why Turkmenistan cut its gas supply)

[ilteris7]

http://www.nypost.com/seven/01142008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/irans_latest_ethnic_revolt_876610.htm?page=0

January 14, 2008 -- FACING ethnic revolts in both Baluchistan and Kur distan, the last thing that Tehran might have wanted was a similar problem in another corner of Iran with a non-Persian majority.

Yet that seems to be happening in Golestan, one of Iran's 30 provinces, with the ethnic Turkmen community seething with anger against Tehran. It all started on Jan. 4, when a gunboat of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps shot and killed a 20-year-old Turkmen fisherman in the coastal waters of the Caspian Sea.

The authorities claim that the fisherman, one Hissmauddin Khadivar, had been part of an illegal fishing expedition whose 30 or so members were later arrested and that his death was an accident.

As news of the incident spread, bands of angry Turkmen, some armed with daggers and sticks, attacked government offices and set vehicles on fire. One group attacked a police station; another tried to lay siege to the local Revolutionary Guard barracks near the fishing port of Bandar-Turkmen.

Eyewitnesses say the riots lasted until late Sunday night (Jan. 6), ending after reinforcements flew in from other cities. Over the two days, more than 300 people were arrested and taken away to unknown destinations. A spokesman for the Turkmen Human Rights Group said dozens were injured. How many might have died is unclear, because the Guard took some of the injured with them, ostensibly for hospitalization in other towns.

In the following days, anti-government demonstrations rocked a number of other cities, including Gonbad Kavous and Quchan, where Turkmens are a majority. A state of emergency remains in force in Bandar Turkmen and Gonbad Kavous.

The Turkmen anger appears to have been so strong and widespread as to oblige the government in Ashgabat, capital of neighboring Turkmenistan, to stop its flow of natural gas to Iran, provoking a diplomatic tussle with Tehran.

Turkmens number around 2.2 million and form a majority in Golestan province. They are also present in North Khorassan (along the border with the former Soviet Republic of Turkmenistan) and the Caspian province of Mazandaran. Turkmens say Iran has gerrymandered them across four provinces to curtail their political influence by denying them the number of seats they might otherwise have won in the Islamic Consultative Assembly, Iran's ersatz parliament.

An Altaic people sharing racial roots with the Uzbeks, the Kazakh and the Kyrgyz, the Turkmens are easily distinguishable from other Iranians thanks to their skin color, slanted eyes and other Asiatic features. Their distinct languages, Yamut and Koklan, are related to Turkish, Korean, Chinese and Japanese. And they are overwhelmingly Sunni Muslims, while some 86 percent of Iranians are Shiites.

In the 1920s, Iran's Turkmens rose in revolt and declared a Soviet Republic with support from Moscow. The short-lived republic was destroyed by Reza Khan, the general who became Iran's shah in 1925. Over 200 Turkmen chiefs were hanged and hundreds of families transported far from Turkmen territories. After the fall of the shah, the Turkmens again rose in revolt. Their so-called republic was soon crushed by the Revolutionary Guard, ordered by Ayatollah Khomeini to treat the rebels as "miscreants waging war on Allah." The Guard hanged hundreds of militants and threw thousands into prison camps until the mid-'90s.

Khadivar isn't the first Turkmen fisherman to be killed in an incident involving the Guard's naval units in the Caspian. Since Tehran banned unauthorized fishing in the inland sea in 1996, dozens of men in search of caviar-rich sturgeon have died in clashes with security forces.

Why did Khadivar's death trigger such anger? Some observers point to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's economic policies, which have produced a 17 percent inflation rate and thrown thousands out of work. Unemployment among the Turkmens is estimated at 40 percent, three times the official national rate.

Another grievance is the government's refusal to allow Turkmens even a toehold in local administration. All top jobs in Golestan and in Turkmen towns in other provinces are held by Shiites from other parts of Iran. The government prefers to employ migrant workers from Afghanistan and Baluchistan to work in the Turkmen area's vast state-owned cotton fields. And by making Caspian fishing a state monopoly, Iran has deprived many Turkmens of a traditional source of income.

Tehran has also imposed central control on water distribution from the River Atrak, reserving the bulk of it for state-owned farms and estates, owned by rich mullahs and Guard commanders, where few Turkmens work. Turkmen farmers, mostly smallholders, are left with little or no water.

Turkmens also complain of a massive government campaign to convert them to Shiism. While no permit is issued for building Sunni mosques, the number of Shiite places of prayer and mourning has multiplied in Turkmen towns and villages. Shiite mullahs from Qom conduct periodic conversion "raids" into Turkmen towns and villages, using the promise of jobs and perks as inducements.

Turkmens claim that they have the lowest life expectancy in Iran and that they are denied fair access to higher education. Those who manage to apply for university places are often turned away because they fail religious tests based on Shiism; their inadequate mastery of Persian reduces their chances further.

Tehran authorities blame the Turkmen revolt on "secessionists" and "counterrevolutionaries," allegedly supported by the United States. In fact, the revolt highlights the failure of a narrowly based ideological regime to understand the pluralist nature of Iranian society and the legitimate aspirations of its diverse component parts for dignity, equal opportunity and a fair share in decision-making.

 Thanks to Memluk(a member of Turania site) for sharing this news with us

 

[ilteris9]

The Persiansand their like are one of the biggest rivals of Turkic peoples.