H"-'------------'-'---'--'--'-------------'---7 ,'.i - - 7--_-----7_ -----i -- - - '- - ---- - - -'------ --T="-W" 'l -- .,.:=- : ----'-- - -- -' ------ I -H " !'- :tA'J-' SOUTH a' ' l'l' o"<'"'%% HAUZMERABNAR}JANGNHITS CENTRE ! fl ;,I :i W Ladies "' and gentlemen, Dear honoured members, dear attendants of the Eleventh Session of the Forum on Minority ISsues focusing on Statelessness as a major human rights issue, 11 (f :i ;l ,) a' :l My name Centre. is Araz Yurdseven, I am honoured Azerbaijani representing to be here today South Azerbaijani speaking about Human Rights the my nation, Turks, stateless, with no basic human rights recognizedunderIranian-Persianoccupationwhichislastingfroml925until South and no national rights now. South Azerbaijan Persian live which occupation used be called has become in a self-exile in other "bread basket a land that millions parts of Iran of the region'5, of its inhabitants and other countries during (z 1% H'l under has left to the last 93 years.Most of the namesof the cities,villages,areas,rivers,mountains and lands were Pahlavies changed from and so Islamic Turkish to Persian Republic. Lake by the occupation Urmu, the most regime important of factor in the '.:l ecosystem fl 4 building over30unnecessary dams. Thelandwhere LakeUrmuwas,nowisa lil I:J of South Azerbaijan is systematically dried up by.the governtnent by desert, creating toxicwinds blowing insurrounding regions, destroying any chanceof agriculture. SouthAzerbaijanis graduallybecoming uninhabitable under Iranian-Persian South Azerbaijani systematic Turks, assimilation, aspect of life, simple education govern_n"ient from minor, de-Turkification, office a common for children, language, and from of Persian. some major, a national of defying torture occurrences language such as taking government protests regime until and murder for South a simple and businesses, affair of parts writing, speaking, Randomly everything by the Iranian Azerbaijani Turks. plain-clothed is many of South and some or meeting responded and targeted to in the In the last 93 years, control to In every of the region, all and all, were now. subjected for a year 1945-1946, in the streets, the occupation, were Persificaiton. workplaces in the affairs creating beatings, and forced and foreign by the Iranian-Persian arrests, name occupation, to the representation such as peaceful the purpose Iranian-Persian in the mother by people, Azerbaijan, under choosing done in the forced uprisings occupation. very for harshly kidnappings, authorities At the present time, are