Decree of the CC CPSU Politburo to Mir Bagirov CC Secretary of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, 'Measures to Organize a Separatist Movement in Southern Azerbaijan and Other Provinces of Northern Iran'

[Handwritten across the upper left-hand corner: “One copy for Yemel'yanov.”]


TOP SECRET

To Cde. Bagirov

Measures to Organize a Separatist Movement in Southern Azerbaijan and Other Provinces in Northern Iran

1. Consider it advisable to begin preparatory work to form a national autonomous Azerbaijan district [oblast'] with broad powers within the Iranian state.

At the same time develop a separatist movement in the provinces of Gilan, Mazandaran, Gorgan, and Khorasan.

2. Establish a democratic party in Southern Azerbaijan under the name “Azerbaijan Democratic Party” with the objective of guiding the separatist movement. The creation of the Democratic Party in Southern Azerbaijan is to be done by a corresponding reorganization of the Azerbaijani branch of the People's Party of Iran and drawing into it supporters of the separatist movement from all strata of the population.

3. Conduct suitable work among the Kurds of northern Iran to draw them into the separatist movement to form a national autonomous Kurdish district.

4. Establish in Tabriz a group of responsible workers to guide the separatist movement, charging them with coordinating [kontaktirovat'] their work with the USSR General Consulate in Tabriz.

Overall supervision of this group is entrusted to Bagirov and Yakubov.

5. Entrust the Azerbaijan CP(b) CC (Bagirov and Ibragimov) with developing preparatory work to hold elections in Southern Azerbaijan to the 15th Convocation of the Iranian Majlis, ensuring the election of deputies who are supporters of the separatist movement on the basis of the following slogans:

a) Allotment of land to the peasants from state and large landowning holdings and awarding long-term monetary credit to the peasants;

b) Elimination of unemployment by the restoration and expansion of work at enterprises and also by developing road construction and other public works;

c) Improvement of the organization of public amenities of cities and the public water supply;

d) Improvement in public health;

e) Use of no less than 50% of state taxes for local needs;

f) Equal rights for national minorities and tribes: opening schools and publication of newspapers and books in the Azerbaijani, Kurdish, Armenian, and Assyrian languages; court proceedings and official communications in local institutions in their native language; creating a provincial administration, including the gendarmerie and police, from local national elements; formation of regional, district, and city enjumens [and] local self-governing bodies.

g) Radical improvement in Soviet-Iranian relations.

6. Combat groups armed with weapons of foreign manufacture are to be created with the objective of selfdefense for pro-Soviet people [and] activists of the separatist movement of democratic and Party organizations. Entrust Cde. [Nicolai] Bulganin together with Cde. Bagirov with carrying out this point.

7. Organize a Society for Cultural Relations Between Iran and the Azerbaijani SSR to strengthen cultural and propaganda work in Southern Azerbaijan.

8. To draw the broad masses into the separatist movement, [we] consider it necessary to create a “Society of Friends of Soviet Azerbaijan” in Tabriz with branches in all regions of Southern Azerbaijan and Gilan.

9. Entrust the CC CP(b) of Azerbaijan with organizing publication of an illustrated magazine in Baku for distribution in Iran and also three new newspapers in Southern Azerbaijan.

10. Commit the OGIZ [State Publishing House](Yudin) to allocating three flat-bed printing presses for the use of the CC CP(b) of Azerbaijan to create printing resources [tipografskaya baza] for the Democratic Party of Southern Azerbaijan.

11. Commit the Narkomvneshtorg [People's Commissariat for Foreign Trade] (Cde. [Anastas] Mikoyan) with providing good paper for the publication of the illustrated magazine in Baku and also the three new daily newspapers in Southern Azerbaijan; the total press run is to be no less than 30,000 copies.

12. Permit the NKVD of the Azerbaijan SSR, under the observation of Cde. Bagirov, to issue permission for departure to Iran and return from Iran of persons being sent on business connected with putting these measures into effect.

13. To finance the separatist movement in Southern Azerbaijan and also to hold elections to the 15th Convocation of the Iranian Majlis; to create in the CC CP(b) of Azerbaijan a special fund of one million foreign-currency rubles (“for conversion into tumans”).

6 July 1945
CC VKP(b) Politburo

Distribution: 1-2 Cde. Molotov; 3-4 Cde. Bagirov;5- Cde. Kavtaradze.