YEZIDI PROTEST AT EMBASSY

S E C R E T YEREVAN 000528

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EUR/CARC

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/27/2017
TAGS: PGOV PTER PHUM IR AM
SUBJECT: YEZIDI PROTEST AT EMBASSY

REF: A) 07 YEREVAN 274 B) 06 YEREVAN 1484

Classified By: Poloff Masha Herbst for reasons 1.4 (b, d).

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SUMMARY
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1. (S) About 15 Yezidis protested in front of the Embassy
April 27, carrying Armenian-language signs that read "Stop
the genocide of Yezidis" and "23 killed in Mosul." They were
protesting the deaths of 23 Yezidi workers who were shot in
Mosul, Iraq, on April 22. The protest was the first in
recent memory that was organized by Yezidis, as opposed to
the Kongra-Gel/KGK (reftel),and was significantly less
robust than those orchestrated by the Kurdish group. Embassy
officers met with two representatives of the protesters: the
self-appointed "leader of all Yezidis worldwide" Aziz
Tamoyan, and Tayar Musafryan, a self-identified a Yezidi
religious leader. END SUMMARY.


2. (SBU) Tamoyan and Musafryan told us they had spoken by
phone with Yezidis in Iraq, who told them that the gunmen who
had killed the Yezidi workers were Kurds. The Armenian
Yezidis expressed their concern for the safety of the Yezidis
in Iraq, who they say are under constant threat of attack by
the Kurds, without any guarantee of safety from either
coalition forces or the Iraqi government.


3. (S) We took the opportunity to ask Tamoyan and Musafryan
about whether there was any friction between Kurds and
Yezidis in Armenia. They said there are very few Kurds here,
but confirmed that the KGK was active in Armenia. Tamoyan
told us that, in addition to the PKK office in Yerevan, there
was one in the Kurdish village of Alagyaz, which is about an
hour from the capital. (NOTE: The Yezidi are closely related
to Kurds; the main difference between the two cultures is
religious. While most Kurds are Muslim, the Yezidi practice
a distinct religion, rooted in Zoroastrianism, which forbids
eating lettuce and wearing the color blue. Some Armenian
Yezidi, including the fiercely nationalistic Tamoyan, refuse
to acknowledge that they speak Kurmanji, or Northern Kurdish,
insisting instead that they speak "Yezidiki," which they say
is a separate language. END NOTE.)


4. (S) COMMENT: This protest was unique, in that it was the
first in recent memory that was organized by Yezidis, as
opposed to the KGK (reftels). The fact that the organizers
could only muster 15 demonstrators, however, speaks to the
fractiousness of the community. The KGK's reported practice
of paying Yezidis a few dollars and bussing them in from the
villages to protest for Abdullah Ocalan's release tends to be
more effective; over 150 people participated in the last such
demonstration (ref A).
GODFREY