Coll 28/112A ‘Persia. Tabriz – Monthly despatches of internal situation in Azerbaijan & misc. reports.’ [‎588r] (1178/1237)

3
express or feel any regrets at losing such a detested and mostly undesii able
element.
9. The demagogic movement in favour of Azerbaijan autonomy ana
democracy in general on which I was reporting in iabriz a month or two ago
/fc^eems to have faded out almost completely. It is possible that the Russian
political bureau realised on what unreliable and broken reeds they were basing
their surreptitious hopes—as I half-facetiously warned them at the time. Instead
the city is now invested with several so-called 11 committees, one of which
styles itself “ Committee for the Protection of the Proletariat of Azerbaijan.
About a week ago it was learnt to be summoning landowners or employers to
appear before it to decide on complaints brought against them by aggrieved
members of the said proletariat. One such unwilling defendant ventured to
inform the police, who made enquiries and found that the leading light was a
Soviet citizen named Ismailoff. Before arresting the “committee” the chief
of police saw the Soviet Consul-General, who is said to have asked him to delay
action while he made enquiries. After a few days my colleague asked for a
further delay for enquiries, and there the matter still rests. It must be getting
tiresome for him continually to have to deny or cover up the stupidities and
intrigues of another department over whom he has no control and of whos^
goings-on he probably has little knowledge until they are pointed out to him b\
the Governor-General or myself. . ,
10. I am told that the old man who was recently Deputy for Sauj Bulagh
and its district has now resigned and returned to his village, so that the area is
unrepresented in the Tehran Majlis, and its problems not made known to
the Central Government. This is probably all the more true because the Sauj
Bulagh area is normally under Rezaieh, where administration is practically
broken down and communications at present non-existent, so that the Governor-
General of Tabriz is having to do most of the work piecemeal as it arises, possibly
without reporting on that district to Tehran. One Kurdish chieftain has
suggested that Sauj Bulagh should be attached to the Kermanshah Province, so
as & to prevent Russian political officers from interfering there as they do at
present. A new Deputy would certainly seem advisable.
11. The cost of living here is causing anxiety, and imported goods which
cannot be easily replaced are soaring in price. It is well known that certain
merchants have bought up and hoarded stocks, but no one expects the
Administration to take any steps in the matter. Fortunately supplies of bread
and sugar are sufficient, but rice is dear and cotton piece-goods excessi\elv so.
The fringe of the unemployment problem is being touched by relief works, from
which labourers receive 6 rials per day. .
12. When I mentioned to the Governor-General of labriz that m Kezaieti
the policemen were still only receiving the miserable and inadequate pay of
120 rials a month instead of the 240 rials to which they were now entitled, he
said he felt practically sure that the authorities there had received the full
amount for the proper pay rolls. It seems difficult, even allowing for the
incredibly corrupt Administration in these parts, to suppose that the whole of
the bonus has vanished so far into higher officials’ pockets, and yet it is
not impossible. I have heard that the recent Chief of Gendarmerie m Azerbaijan,
who practically deserted his post when conditions became too difficult for his
timid and disappointing personality, left for Tehran with a whole lorry-load of
miscellaneous stuff, supposed to be contraband acquired in the Rezaieh area with
money squeezed out of the district (perhaps the gendarmes’ extra pay) I myself
saw this loaded lorry outside his office on the evening he left, and wondered what
it was. since everyone knew he had not brought his family or furniture here when
he came a few months ago. However, he is related to someone in the Ministry,
and will doubtless immediately receive another good post. Another case is where
a detachment of gendarmes were known to ha\e seized twenty-five rifles in one
village, but the arms were never handed in. When enquiries were made, it was
found that the gendarmes had sold the rifles back again to peasants or tribesmen
and pocketed the money. After all, how can a man keep a wife and family on
4 rials, or 6^., a day? There must be plenty of similar cases, and it is
useless for the Persian Government to complain about the dangerous number of
rifles stolen or unaccounted for while such conditions obtain among the guardians
of public order. Until the whole of the corrupt officers are changed, however,