The Kurds in former Soviet Union

Although there are no Kurdish territories in the USSR there are a number of compact Kurdish settlements. According to the 1070 census there were about 40,000 Kurds in Armenia, and another 21,000 Kurds in Georgia, mainly in Tiblisi, which has a Kurdish quarter. The Kurds of these two areas are mainly Yazidis who moved there to escape persecuation in Sinjar and Shaikhan. In Azerbaijan the Kurds number about 150,000, whilst there are at few thousand Kurds in Kirghiz and Kazakhstan also.

There are historical reasons for the wide dispersion of Soviet Kurds. A number of Kurdish tribes migrated in to the Caucasus region in the secound part of the 18th Century, whilst those in Central Asia arrived as a result of their use by the Persian Shahs in the 16th Century to guard their eastern border. The Kurds of Kirghiz and Kazakhstan were forcibly deported from the Caucasus (Georgia and Armenia) in 1937-1938 for provoking frontier incidents. Even before glasnost there was a measure of cultural freedom for Kurds: they were allowed their own schools, school books and press. A radio station broadcasts in Kurdish to the whole of Kurdistan. There is a strong sense of identity amongst some Kurds with those elsewhere, and this would seem to override ideological considerations, as exemplified in the remark made by one Kurd:

'we know that Barzani is no revolutionary, that he is in fact more of conservative, but for us he is a symbol, symbol of our Kurdishness. When people come in they can see that we are Kurds ( a picture of Barzani hangs on the wall).During your stay here you must have been told that when the Kurdish uprising collapsed in Iraq, everybody in our community went into mourning'.

The Kurds are a very small minority in USSR, one the 100 nationalities recognize. Allpwing them cultural freedom in no way threatens the state. Would the state be so tolerant if they were as large a percentage as in Iran, Iraq or Turkey, particularly if (as they are not) they contiguous with other large concentrations of Kurds over the border?


Write by David Mcdowall