Perhaps, no one may be surprised by the rampage and injustice, taking place in Iran.

Recently world mass media were writing about the Iranian police beating and dragging a woman along the ground, because her hijab was loose. This woman’s story reached media because somebody could film it, but there are thousands of such situations, not filmed by anyone.

Of course all citizens of Iran suffer from the repressive clerical regime, but if u are a member of any national minority, you suffer more.

Being a national minority in Iran means not having a right to receive education in your native language, not having a right to give your children national names, sometimes being afraid to tell about your national identity.

It turns out that in the age of space travel and high speed internet, there are still countries, where people are deprived of basic rights.

Iran’s ethnolinguistic minorities continue to face forced assimilation

While Iran tries to “teach the whole Middle East how to live”, terrible things, which do not correspond to Islamic morality and elementary dictates of humanity, happen within the country.

National minorities of Iran are the most vulnerable group in this country, their discrimination is systematic and has begun since Reza Shah Pahlavi, then continued by his son and then Mullahs took the baton. Iran is a multi-national country, in which the authorities try to create “Iranian nation”, namely, to substitute national identity by total-Iranian with Shiite ideology.

Newly-leaked documents describe ‘Iranian state-sanctioned persecution of Baha’is’

Besides Persians, four main ethnic groups – Azerbaijanis, Kurds, Arabs and Baloch live in the country. There are also other peoples. Each of these nations suffered and suffers from discrimination and racist attacks by Shah’s regime and Mullocray.

Prison data shows that at least three quarters of Iran’s political prisoners are from ethnic minorities. Arabs, Kurds, Azerbaijani Turks and Balochis have been mistreated, targeted on the basis of their identity and sidelined from education, health care and other basic services, according to the rights groups.

Many national activists in Iran were executed, according to the report of Amnesty International, slightly more than half of all death penalties are committed in Iran.

Think about this figure.

Azerbaijanis are the second ethnic group in Iran only to Persians. There are more Azerbaijanis in Southern Azerbaijan, Iran, than in the Azerbaijan Republic in Northern Azerbaijan.

VIDEO: Harsh treatment of non-Persian ethnic minorities in Iran

The amount of Azerbaijanis in Iran is between 20 – 30 million, by various estimations. However, the paradox of the Iranian regime is that this amount of people doesn’t have basic national rights, including receiving education in their mother language.

It is about tens of millions of people, more than the combined population of Norway, Sweden and Finland.

Iranian state media and state and social activists periodically make racist statements against Azerbaijani population.

Recently, Ali Younesi, former head of Iranian intelligence and currently an Adviser to the President of Iran for the affairs of ethnic minorities gave an interview to the voice of Iranian “reformists” – “Ghanoon Daily”.

During a brief interview Younesi made two racist statements against Azerbaijanis, saying that “Azerbaijanis living in Iran are actually Persians and their language is a part of Persian language”. This kind of statement, of course, couldn’t go unnoticed by Azerbaijani social activists. 50 parliament members of Azerbaijani and Turkic origin signed a letter of protest addressed to President Rouhani.

It is noteworthy that in 2015 Younesi claimed that “Azerbaijanis were Kurds in the past”.

Another racist statement in Younesi’s interview was against Arabs living in Iran. Younesi thinks that “Arabs living in Iran are actually Arabized Persians”. And it was said against the background of the recent suppression of Ahwazis’ protests in the South of Iran.

And one of the reasons of the protests of Arabs living in the Ahwaz region was the racist policy of the Iranian regime.

Reviewing other statements of Younesi, we can conclude that he is deliberately provoking. From the other side, Younesi, as an Adviser for the affairs of minorities, is doing his best to turn minorities against each other. It is possible that Younesi expresses points and ideas, his chief doesn’t want to express.

For example, in 2015 during one conference Younesi said: “All of the Middle East is Iranian, and this region will be strongly defended because it is part of Iran”, he also added: “My country plans to establish an Iranian federation in the region”.

Against the background of the crisis, which Iran has faced, attacks on minorities in this country can lead to the developments, which will put an end to IRI in its current shape.

A big part of minorities both in the North and in the South has already understood that wars and expansionist policy of Iran do not bode well and their prosperity and well-being is impossible in the current Iranian regime.

written by: Ali Hajizade