Authors |
Occupation: Senior researcher Affiliation: Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Address: Moscow, Moscow, Rozhdestvenka str., 12
Occupation: Senior Researcher; Associate Professor Affiliation: Institute of Oriental Studies
Russian State University for the Humanities
HSE University
Address: Russian Federation, Moscow
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Abstract | The second part of the article about case file of the Kurdish leader Mustafa Barzani, preserved in the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History (RGASPI) provides information regarding his material support, in particular, the allocation of apartments, including at an address previously unknown in historical literature. The article also examines information about Mustafa Barzani and the activities of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), contained in the documents, in particular, in KGB reports. In some of them, Mustafa Barzani is characterized extremely negatively – as a reactionary and clerical leader, opposing the integration of Iraqi Kurds into Soviet society and being anti-Soviet; in another, later reference, the personality of Mustafa Barzani is already assessed in the opposite way, due to the Soviet Union's support for the Kurdish liberation movement movements in Iraq. Interesting information is presented about the contradictions in the leadership of the KDP and various aspects of relations with the communists. Considerable attention is paid to documents relating to Barzani’s interaction with his comrades, maintaining control over them, relations with Iraqi public figures, as well as Kurdish activists. Three letters from Barzani to Nikita Khrushchev are studied in detail.
Archive materials show that Moscow had a very high estimation of Barzani’s role, so information about him was reported to the higher tiers of power, where he was regarded as the most influential person in the Kurdish national movement. Almost every document demonstrates his unwavering adherence to the national idea and his resolve to return to Kurdistan to continue the struggle. |