AZERI SEPARATISTS CLAIM WIDE AUTONOMY IN IRAN

PanARMENIAN.Net - Leaders of Southern Azerbaijan National Renascence Movement announced the other day about the intention of Iranian Azeris to transform Iran into a federal state. If Tehran uses weapons against the Azeri activists, "Novye Izvestiya" Russian newspaper writes, they will resort to armed struggle for independence. The movement leaders intend to get countenance and moneyed assistance from the US where they have recently held a number of meetings with officials of different levels. Experts suppose that the Azeris' national liberation movement is the best way to bring Iran to collapse. In the opinion of the newspaper, Americans have already begun making use of the "Azeri factor" in Iran. Political organizations supporting the Azeri separatists in Iran such as, e.g., "Great Azerbaijan Union," are being legally formed in Baku funded by them. The separatist movement of Azeris in Iran is as well supported by the Azerbaijan's leading opposition parties, namely the National Front of Azerbaijan, Musavat and the others. Moreover, the newspaper writes, chairman of the Baku office of the initiative group of the parliament of Southern Azerbaijan Aslan Khalidi offers Azeris to entirely secede from Iran. Today the number of Azeris in Iran, according to various estimates, varies between 20 and 30 million. They mainly reside in three large north-western provinces of Iran - Western Azerbaijan, Eastern Azerbaijan and Mugan. Feeling Azeri separatist becoming active, Teheran undertakes urgent measures. Considerable contingents of "guards of the Islamic revolution" are already sent to Mugan province. But rumor that the US plans to place a 15-thousand contingent of its troops in Azerbaijan causes special concern of Tehran. There is no official proof of this hearsay yet, but there is such an opportunity. As supposed by the newspaper, it can be done on the plea of, for example, guarding the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline.