Coll 28/112A ‘Persia. Tabriz – Monthly despatches of internal situation in Azerbaijan & misc. reports.’ [‎419r] (840/1237)

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others, some are useless, while the Russians are supposed to be
hostile to Farshi, Isfahan! and Isfahanian. They are thought to be
hostile also to Afshar, the present deputy from Rezaieh.
5. Mr. Jurabchi states that there may be something like 200 candi
dates for the 19 seats allotted to Azerbaijan. He says that the
Governor-General, now in Tehran, has had many requests for support
from would-be candidates there, and I have no doubt that many of
'them are merchants and absentee landlords who left Tabriz when the
(ussians came. They may wish to become deputies partly because
trade is dull and they have little to do, partly because they wish
to !iake a stand against the "menace^ of communism.
6. The following are the groups apparent here at this stage
a) The industrialists, landlords, merchants and propertied
classes generally. They have no official political organisation,
and at the moment it looks as if far too many candidates will come
forward from this section of the population.
b) Tudeh Iran - local leader All Amiri Khizi. This group has
the support of Mohammed Ali Akhbari, editor of the newspaper
w Goftar ve Kirdar ,f , but for lack of funds the paper is not appearing
at present. The aims of this party are as prescribed by the head
quarters in Tehran.
°) Iran Bidar - led by Hussein Guli Katibi, editor of the
w Fariad M newspaper. He has a following among doctors, young men
with pretensions to education, end some merchants; a sort of in
telligentsia, who proclaim that Iran must awake. I enclose the
translation of a recent article from the "Fariad*.
d) Azadi Khakhan - liberal party led by the old agitator Sar-
tib Zadeh, who for a brief period was, or claimed to be, the leader
hereof Tudeh Iran until displaced by Ali Amiri Khizi. He has the
support of the M Sahend” newspaper, whose editor, Habib Aghazadeh, is
still a fugitive in Tehran, having been markedly pro-German. The
paper now advocates democracy.
The Labour Union - The present leader is Mutallib Latifi.
There is a strong Caucasian tinge about this group; they make much
of being anti-fascist, and are thought to have close contacts with
the Russians. I enclose the translation of a manifesto which they
have just distributed in leaflet form.
7. Of these groups the Tudeh is best organised and it is showing
its greatest activity in Sastern Azerbaijan. It is reported to have
representatives in Sarab, Ardebil, Mishkinshahr, Marand, and to be
holding meetings in these and smaller towns. This is natural,,
because in this area a great number of the male workers have had
contact with Russians and have thereby satis been made more recentive
of modern or even revolutionary ideas. As you know, there was, until
Reza Shah stopped it, a movement from Azerbaijan into the Caucasus
of labourers who worked there to accumulate a few hundred gold
roubles and then return. Then there are the ’’refugees”, those Persian
subjects who spent years in Russia, learned the language, married
Russian women, and so on. Although they had little reason to be
grateful to the Russians they found it hard to content themselves
with the bleak prospect of life in Persia. If there is any material
fit for social revolution in this country, it is among these men in
Eastern Azerbaijan; but they are nowhere compact, scattered as they
are over a mainly agricultural or pastoral area. Moreover, I am told,
they and the peasantry generally jumped to the conclusion when the
Russians arrived that the lana would be divided among them forthwith,
and you will recollect some agitation in the villages against landlords
immediately after the occupation; but instead of a division of land
there has been, in Eastern Azerbaijan, & gradual restoration of
Persian authority, the reappearance of soldiers, gendarmes and
officials. So these Russian-minded Persians, and the peasantry
generally, are disillusioned, and inclined to be sceptical of the
promises of the Tudeh speakers, even when they hint that they have
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