The Participation of Kurdish Youth in the Current Liberation Movement

If it has been only ten years or so that the youth in other parts of Iran have entered the stage of struggle so widely against the backwardness and obstinacy of the regime, and the lack of their rights and the rights of their co-citizen, in Kurdistan resistance against the Islamic Republic among the youth in its best and sharpest form has a longer history.  The Kurdish youth due to the existence of prior national movements in Kurdistan and the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan in the forefront of struggle as an experienced and a popular force among the Kurds have not been swayed by the deceitfulness of Islamic Republic.  Their national sentiment after the free atmosphere that was followed from the overthrow of the monarchy was revived, and in defense of freedom and the existence of their nation and supporting the national demands and wants of the Kurds stepped into the forefront of struggle.  Within the period of more than two decades of imposed war of the Islamic Republic on the people of Kurdistan, the Kurdish youth have not withheld from any sacrifices in defending the existence of the Kurdish nation and the advancement of revolutionary movement.  They have composed the major force of their movement, both in the ranks of the ‘peshmargas’ (freedom fighters) and in the undercover activities and other means of struggle, have had a more noticeable presence than any other stratum of Kurdish society.  The majority of martyrs of the battlefields and resistance (either those who have lost their lives confronting the aggressor regime of the Islamic Republic or those whose lives have been taken in the regime’s prisons) have been Kurdish youth.

             Another gratifying stage of the youth of Kurdistan is their activeness and struggle in new conditions that have been imposed on Iran and Kurdistan within the last few years.  This struggle deserves a deliberate attention from many aspects that at the same time is a source of hopefulness.

            First characteristic is the rise of the level of understanding and knowledge in political and general issues of the contemporary Kurdish youth generation.  Even though the people of Kurdistan within the last twenty years have always been under the oppression and the imposed war of Islamic Republic, and their Kurdish youth because of religion and national issues have faced discrimination in school and universities in various ways, this generation has not been left behind and has attempted to develop itself in many ways.  Many of them, have both studied until the edge of university and gained important scientific, educational and training knowledge, and have also acquired good political and general knowledge and understanding.  Of course, the existence and the presence of a powerful revolutionary movement in Kurdistan and the deep influence of this national movement among the people have had a well-deserved effect in this regard.

            The second characteristic of struggle of today’s Kurdish youth that is appropriate to be mentioned is that fortunately they have not lost their true path, and in the competition and conflict of the rulers of Islamic Republic, they have not followed any faction or wing; instead, they have stepped into the battlefields for the advancement and attainment of theirs and their peoples’ rights.

            The third attribute that must be mentioned with pride is the expansion and the development of national sentiment and understanding among today’s Iranian Kurdistan youth.  Even though in Kurdistan as in the other parts of Iran that the regime has tried for years to train the children according to its cultural thinking and belief, and even though in Tehran and other major cities in opposing the regime’s imposed culture moving towards western culture and customs have increased, in Kurdistan paying attention to national sentiment and thought is considered very important and is still developing.

            The form and the method of expressing national feeling and sentiment are diverse.  The successive joining of the youth to the struggling ranks of PDKI, celebrating the New Year, and converting these celebrations to a national demonstration, organizing demonstrations for various occasions and reasons and expressing their national demands in them, opposing the disrespect and the contempt of national identity and pride by the regime’s authorities, are a few instances of expression of national sentiment among the Kurdish youth.

            The expansion of cultural activities among today’s youth of Kurdistan, and forming special groups and communities devoted to these activities, is one of the characteristics of the current struggle.  The precious cause of this struggle is serving the Kurdish language, culture and literature.  Intellectuals and the aware and brave youth of Kurdistan have tried to build a cooperative spirit among them by taking advantage of this limited opportunity that has emerged in Iran, and in this way strengthen their national sentiment in the service of their nation.  They have considered various stages and methods of activities.  Participation in publishing several Kurdish magazines and weeklies, conducting theatre festivals, organizing literary conventions and praising great Kurdish poets, paying importance to cinema and producing films and attracting viewers attention to the realities of Kurdistan, publishing books in Kurdish and developing story-telling and novel-writing, and establishing learning and writing classes of Kurdish language are among the steps that have been taken in the last few years.

            The important point is the increasing number of Kurdish university students and their departure to large Iranian cities for continuing studies in various university levels.  Many of these students have created for themselves another stage for their admirable activities.  They have taken the role of conveying their demands and wants to universities outside Kurdistan.  In fact, Kurdish students have become Kurdish representatives in these centers, and inform students from other parts of the country from the conditions imposed on Kurdistan, and explain the realities of Kurdistan to them.

            In this regard it is impossible to ignore the problems and obstacles that the Kurdish youth have to struggle with:

- The excessive sensitivity of the intelligence and oppressive apparatuses of Islamic Republic in regards to the activities of Kurdistan youth has practically led to a point that any of their attempts or activities is extremely under scrutiny that they become under suspicions and face opposition and abstrictions.

- Unemployment is one of the leading problems for the youth in Kurdistan.  Because of unemployment, many of the Kurdish youth get into the smuggling business as a result of the proximity of their region to the borders (Turkey and Iraq).  A considerable number of youth in this smuggling business become victims of land mines or get attacked by the regime’s gunmen and get killed or injured.  The Islamic Republic authorities also capture many of them, and confiscate all their possessions.

- Leaving Kurdistan for large cities of Iran and other remote regions of the country seeking employment that has been around for a long time still continues.  Many of these migrants are Kurdish youth who unwillingly reside in an environment away from their relatives to sustain the livelihood of their families.

- Another aspect of the migration of the Kurdish youth is immigrating to Western countries.  Every day groups of Iranian Kurdish youth illegally and in various ways reach the UNHCR offices in the cities of Turkey, and seek refugee status and demand their resettlement in other countries.  These migrant youth have various purposes of choosing this hard and difficult path; most of them flee this misery that the rulers have created for the people of our country especially the youth, or as a result of political activeness they have been threatened by detainment and punishment, and there are those who leave for continuing studies.

- The outlawed activities of any Iranian Kurdish organizations or parties by Islamic Republic on the one hand, and the freedom granted to the individuals related to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Iranian Kurdistan on the other has led some of the eager youth to get attracted to assisting this organization in the latest years.  The encouraging force of the Kurdish youth for choosing this path has been the grandiloquence and temptational slogans of the PKK, and at the same time the encouragement of the youth by the Iranian authorities to join this organization.  Unfortunately PKK has taken advantage of the pure sentiment of these youth for the execution of its erroneous policies of animosity towards the Kurdish parties and organizations in various parts of Kurdistan.  But auspiciously, a segment of these youth who had been used and trapped into this betrayal have realized their mistake and have relieved themselves at any cost.

- Among all these obstacles that the Iranian Kurdish youth are faced with, the attempts of the regime’s oppressive and intelligence apparatuses to deviate them is more noticeable.  Spreading of narcotics among the youth, and utilizing various pressures and other methods to dispossess them of their revolutionary character and using them against the PDKI and our nation’s just movement has been a main policy of the regime’s administrators in Kurdistan. 

Despite all these bitter realities, the Kurdish youth in Iran have not lowered their head for this backwardness and forcefulness, and have kept alive in themselves the spirits of struggle and resistance, and have entered the stage with a firm and deliberate intention.  Brave participation filled with sacrifices in the demonstrations, and gathering at the winter of 1999 that the bloody demonstration of February 22 was at its peak, showed that how powerful and creditable the fighting spirit, resistance and revolutionary determination of the Kurdish youth is.

Therefore, the Kurdish revolutionary movement leadership and the Democratic Youth Union of Iranian Kurdistan must pay a special attention to the young forces, and with decisive planning, accurate and appropriate measures support the struggle and resistance of the Kurdish youth for the advancement of the demands and objectives of their nation.

Sources:

- Taken from the political report of the leadership committee of Youth Union to the 1^st Congress

Article translated from KURDISTAN, Organ of the Central Committee of PDKI