Hazara people

[Iroczor]

interesting people

[Siberian Cold Breeze]

Their cultural structure is close to Mongol than Iranian ..and they complain (in forums) Iran is sending mullas to their region ,but for them religion is a personal matter.They don't want to be a part of Iranian religious fundementalism .
this is from Asian finest a Hazara writes

Thanks for your sympathy and feeling for us,

Hazaras goals are to educate their children today and they see it the only way to have a better life for their new generation.
If Mongolian could help Hazaras with education it would a big difference. You can send money for Hazara schools in Afghanistan since most of Hazaras are very poor so they can provide study and school costs for students and teachers.

Second if Mongolian government could give scholarships for Hazara youths to come in Mongolia to study and complete their higher education. As i know most of Hazara youths after finishing schools hasn't got any opportunity to continue their higher education in Afghanistan. There are so many Hazaras passionate to study.

Four Hazara girls were given scholarships by the government of Turkey to come and study in Turkey last year. We are very thankful to Turkey. Japanese governments aids has built many schools for Hazaras in Afghanistan.

I don't know if Nato troops in Afganistan helping them It's so sad

[StonyArabia]

Their cultural structure is close to Mongol than Iranian ..and they complain (in forums) Iran is sending mullas to their region ,but for them religion is a personal matter.They don't want to be a part of Iranian religious fundementalism .
this is from Asian finest a Hazara writes



I don't know if Nato troops in Afganistan helping them It's so sad

Well they are mixed breeds of Mongol Men and Persian women. Thus they do indeed share more Iranian elements than their neighbours like the Pashtuns or Tajiks. They follow 12er Shiaism but many of them are also the followers of Ismaili Shias. The Aga Khan who is the Imam of the Ismailis has created hospitals and even brought them to North America.

The Amaqai among them are Sunnis however and have become more of a different ethnic group.

[Siberian Cold Breeze]

Pastuns hate them.Talibans and Pastuns are responsible of Hazara's suffering..You can cluster them with Pastuns in genetic classification but they feel themselves close to Mongolia ,so are Mongolians

Hi to you,

At this time there are not civil war in Afghanistan most Hazaras live in peace. though Pashtuns and Taliban remnant are not happy with government time to time attacks and kill governmet supporters and inncocet people etc.

We have been suppressed because Afghans specially Pashtuns thinks that Hazaras are invaders and beleive Hazaras has taken their land during Gengis khan, another reason because we are Shia muslim in majority and others sunni muslim. Thirdh reason because we look Mongloid and Pashtuns and Tajiks ethnic groups which are majority look like Arabs, and they are racist toward us.

Did you know during 1880s and 1890s Afghan pashtuns massacred 62% of Hazara population and took 60% of their land thats way we are in minority today. Recently Taliban wanted to annihilate Hazaras and killed thousands of Hazara innocents.

A Mongolian from Asian finest again.

I'm sorry to hear about your situation & difficult life against Afgans. If I were Mongolian president I would say please come to Mongolia all of Hazaras people so you can leave in peace. In Mongolia we have minorities but we don't have any problem among us.
Before we go too far, what do you think we can do for you to help?

Hi,

You know what, Iran's help damage more Hazara people's life as a whole even more. Most Hazaras do not like Iranian at all. When Iran wanted to help they send their money to Mullahs relegios persons. Mullahs can not do anything to make peoples life better. A few of these Mullah who has received Iranian funds, has destroyed Hazara unity by making many stupid political parties based on relegion. Since most Hazaras regard relegion as a personal matter.

There some 40 to 60 thousands Hazaras in Iran right now. Most of them live day and night in hiding and work illegally. They do not have any rights in Iran. Iranians do not even enrol Hazaras children at their school. Most Hazaras children doing labour job. and very few of them has the chance to study a few hours daily or weekly at private courses provided by Hazaras themselves. This is how Iranians has treated Hazaras for decades.

Hazaras speak Hazaragi. its a dialict of Persian. More than 20% o of Hazaragi language icludes Mongol and Turkic words.

But Hazaras new generation are passionate to learn Turkic languages like Uzbeki and Turkman. When Hazaras going to Turkic countries, Hazaras are looking the same as them. Hazaras culture is also similar to their Turkic neighbours. because they have lived closed by for long time.

I personally support more Hazaras association to Turkic neighbouring countries rather than Iran.

^It's very unfortunate what's happening to the Hazaras. Old days glories past, Genghis Khan's army remnants are treated with discrimination in the very land they protected for centuries. It's a shame. Many Hazaras seem to have escaped from their homeland. There are some small communities in various parts of Europe and Canada and the US. Iran isn't exactly a friendly country to Turks. The Turks who have lived in Iran for since the Ilkhanids have been discriminated by Persians. It's something that Turks and Mongols are known for, we're too trusting and honest and others cheat us. The Turks in Iran are mostly in Tabriz. Perhaps the Hazaras who move to Iran should go to Tabriz since there are mostly Turkmen and Azerbaijani Turks there and it might be better there. Anyways, my sincere condolences. I really hope things will be better for the future of Hazaras.

These are Hazara's and Mongol's dialogues ..http://www.asiafinest.com/forum/lofi...hp/t96048.html

[Rereg]

Well they are mixed breeds of Mongol Men and Persian women.

Well I suppose that they have also east-turkic admixture . In Genghis Khan empire lived a lot of different Mongol and Turkic tribes so I doubt that all of Hazara have male predecessors in Mongolia.

Pastuns hate them.

Pashtuns hate all national minority from Afghanistan

[StonyArabia]

Well I suppose that they have also east-turkic admixture . In Genghis Khan empire lived a lot of different Mongol and Turkic tribes so I doubt that all of Hazara have male predecessors in Mongolia.

In general that appears to be the case, of course not but the paternal lineage is heavily Mongolian, unlike the maternal lineage which is pretty much of Persian origins.

Pastuns hate them.Talibans and Pastuns are responsible of Hazara's suffering..You can cluster them with Pastuns in genetic classification but they feel themselves close to Mongolia ,so are Mongolians.

The Pashtuns see them as aliens who subjected and oppressed them and now they treat them as inferior because they see it as payback. As well they don't respect the Hazaras because of their mixed origins. The Pashtuns are Caucasoid and look Indo-Iranic. They don't cluster with Pashtuns at all, because of their Mongol origins. They feel close to Mongolians but they also feel sympathy toward Iran more so than any other outside group. They speak Persian, practice their culture and religion in a very Persian ways, with some significant Mongol influence. The Taliban is composed of Chechens, Uzbeks, Tatars, and Pashtuns it's not a pashtun organization.

[Siberian Cold Breeze]

Religion is not that important .Most Turkic or Mongols do not even follow religious rules .They want education and better life conditions for their children.Iran people are inclined to be too serious about religion and it's their agenda ..
Also Iran people do not like Mongol or Turkic origin people .They are racist and would discriminate Hazara's..
So they don't fit with Iran culture ..
Besides Hazara's real language was Mogholi, a variant of Mongol but only spoken by elders now ..They lost their original language ..it was not Persian.
I don't know if you care these people but I do.Clustering them with Iranians is not helping them.

[Siberian Cold Breeze]

Mongolia: Afghanistan’s Minority Hazara Students Find Peace in Ulaanbaatar


for video pls --http://www.eurasianet.org/node/64351

Ulaanbaatar hardly registers as dream destination for study-abroad scholars. But for a handful of Afghan students, all-expenses-paid undergraduate scholarships to study in Mongolia's capital city present a pragmatic alternative to life in war-torn Kabul.

In the bustling canteen of Mongolia International University (MIU), 21-year-old Nasim Sahel, an ethnic Hazara from Afghanistan’s Bamiyan Province, admits that before his arrival the only image he had of Mongolia was of people riding horses -- "and of course Genghis Khan.” Currently, Sahel and at least 22 other Hazaras study in Mongolia, most of them the recipients of scholarships specifically designed for members of the oft-persecuted minority group back home.

In Afghanistan, Hazaras are believed to be descended from Genghis Khan's marauding forces as they swept through during the Mongol conquests of the 13th century. The name “Hazara” is thought to come from the Persian “hazar,” or thousand, a reference to the hordes. Mostly Shi’a Islam believers and Asian in appearance, Hazaras have endured frequent persecution from their Sunni neighbors. The ethnically Pashtun Taliban singled out the group for mass executions and forced deportations, most notably in Mazar-i-Sharif in 1998, and attacks on their settlements in highland towns like Bamiyan, the provincial capital.

In 2009, Davaabat Sainbayar, director of an online, non-profit networking initiative for Mongolians worldwide -- Tsahim Urtuu, or “Electronic Station” -- was producing a local TV series tracking Mongolians around the globe when he visited a Hazara community in Kabul. Eyewitness accounts of discrimination, "just because they were regarded as Mongols," shocked him. Three months later, with Mongolian government support, he announced the Tsahim Urtuu scholarship program. "Our goal was to help these students, who we view as ethnic Mongolians, and see where it leads," he says. (Scholarships provided to students at MIU, a private institution, are not linked to Tsahim Urtuu.)

The three students chosen for the first round underwent nine months of preparatory language lessons before enrolling in undergraduate classes at the government-run National University of Mongolia (NUM) in 2009. Despite the crash course, language is still “the biggest challenge,” says Zahra Baksh, a second-year business management student. “We often have to translate words from Mongolian into English and if we still don't get it, into Persian."

For most Hazara students, many of whom experienced life as refugees in Iran and Pakistan, their time in Mongolia offers their first taste of prolonged peace and relative stability. Meqdad Salehi, a Tsahim Urtuu scholarship awardee studying international relations at NUM, spent his entire childhood as a displaced person. He was born in Iran to Hazara refugees who had moved there hoping to escape persecution in Afghanistan. Hazaras speak a dialect of Persian. With their Shi’a beliefs, many seek sanctuary in Shi'a Iran, rather than Sunni Pakistan.

Unfortunately for Salehi and many like him, discrimination followed the Hazaras to Iran. "Tajiks and Uzbeks refugees from Afghanistan look more like Iranians. It is more difficult for Hazaras to be accepted because of our Mongolian features," said Salehi. Unable to find easy access to jobs and schooling in Iran, his family moved back to Afghanistan -- just as the Taliban gained control over much of the country in the mid-1990s. Taliban repression forced his family to return to Iran, but they found the environment so unwelcoming that they opted to return to Kabul prior to the 9/11 terrorism tragedy and the subsequent US-led blitz on Afghanistan. "The second time we came back to Afghanistan and then 9/11 happened. We heard Americans would attack so we ran to Pakistan,” Salehi said. The family has since returned to Kabul.

For Sahel, the student from Bamiyan, Mongolia is the opportunity he had always hoped for. "At least there is a country that's supporting me, a country that says, ‘Yes, you belong to me,’ after I've been exiled from Afghanistan and called a slave,” he said. An outspoken student, his hair dyed a reddish blonde, Sahel says the individual freedom he enjoys in Mongolia has been the best part of his experience. Yet he still yearns to return to a peaceful Afghanistan. "I like the idea of being descended from Mongolians, but I belong to Afghanistan."

For Hazara students in Ulaanbaatar, thoughts of home are sobering reminders of the uncertainty that loved ones continue to grapple with. "Each time I hear news of gunfire or bomb blasts in Kabul, I have to fight the urge to panic and think the worst," says Meqdad Salehi.

When asked to describe the situation at home, Zahra Bakhsh, the business management student, mulled the question for a minute. "Afghanistan is like...” she said before pausing. “I don't know how you say it in English …" After a quick Google search she finds a satisfactory way to express her sentiments: "Afghanistan is like a spell no one can break.”
Editor's Note:
Pearly Jacob is a freelance journalist based in Ulaanbaatar.

[leisitox]

They look like mongolid+iranic people IMO

[Sikeliot]

They look like mongolid+iranic people IMO

Yes, my impression too. Kind of like Central Asians. They look Mongoloid to great extent but not enough to pass as fully Mongolian.