In May 2009, the outstanding Soviet and Russian Kurdologist, Doctor of Historical Sciences Professor Manvel Arsenovich Gasratyan (1924 - 2007) would have turned 85 years old. In this regard, on June 1, the Department of Kurdish Studies of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences held a scientific conference dedicated to his memory.

In the first, memorial part, scientists who worked with Gasratyan shared their memories - Head of the Department of Near and Middle East Countries V. Ya.Belokrenitsky, M. S. Lazarev, G. I. Starchenkov, S. F. Oreshkova. Head of the Kurd Studies Department O. I. Zhigalina made a report on the history of Russian Kurd studies and the organization of the Kurd Studies department at the Institute.

As M. S. Lazarev noted, M. A. Gasratyan's contribution to Kurdish studies cannot be overestimated: he dealt with the Kurds of Turkey, and this is more than half of the Kurdish issue in general. At the same time, the Kurdish problem, according to M. S. Lazarev, is likely to overshadow all the problems in the Near and Middle East in the near future. M. S. Lazarev recalled that M. A. Gasratyan said: "Unfortunately, we study states, not peoples."

The speakers noted Gasratyan's natural intelligence, tact, ability to win over and kindness.

In the second part, scientific reports were made by employees of the Kurdish Studies Sector of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences and scientists from other scientific organizations. The presentations were discussed.

M. A. Gasratyan was born on May 21, 1924 in the village of Kalaga in the Ismaili region of the Azerbaijan SSR. Participated in the Great Patriotic War. In 1952 he graduated from the Turkish department of the Moscow Institute of Oriental Studies. It is noteworthy that for his academic success, he was transferred to the forward course. In 1956, at the Faculty of History of Moscow State University, he defended his thesis for the degree of Candidate of Historical Sciences on the topic " The national question in Turkey (1919-1939)". From 1961 to 1967 he worked as a junior researcher, and from 1967 to 1979 as a senior researcher at the Institute of Information Technology of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In 1979, M. A. Gasratyan defended his dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Historical Sciences, and soon received the academic title of professor.

In 1979, at the initiative of the Director of the Institute of Internal Affairs of the Academy of Sciences, E. M. Primakov, a group for the study of the Kurdish question was created in the Department of Near and Middle East Countries, headed by M. A. Gasratyan. In 1984, the group was transformed into the Kurdish Studies sector. In 1990, Professor M. S. Lazarev became the head of the Kurdish Studies sector, and since 2005 the sector has been headed by O. I. Zhigalina.

The establishment of a separate structural unit for Kurdish studies was of great importance for the activation of Kurdish studies.

M. A. Gasratyan has been studying the Kurds and the Kurdish issue for more than half a century. Although many of his works are dedicated to Turkey, it was his Kurdish studies that brought him worldwide fame. Together with M. S. Lazarev, M. A. Gasratyan in the second half of the 1950s-early 1960s of the last century laid the foundations of Moscow, historical and international political (as opposed to Leningrad philological and medieval) Kurdish studies.

M. A. Gasratyan was a representative of classical Russian Kurdish studies. He actively worked with sources, carefully analyzed the printed publications of Kurdish organizations. All his works are based on materials that have already become bibliographic rarities. In fact, for the first time in the world of Kurdish studies, he introduced many sources concerning the Kurdish problem in Turkey into scientific circulation. Hasratyan was personally acquainted with some representatives of the Kurdish National Liberation movement, who sent him materials from parties and organizations.

It is safe to say that M. A. Gasratyan was the only scientist not only in the USSR, but also in the world, who for many years studied the Kurdish problem in Turkey.

Although Kurdish studies (especially the study of the recent history of the Kurds) were actively developing in the 60-80s of the XX century, most of the research was focused on two topics. These were the Kurdish question in the history of international relations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and the national liberation struggle in Iraqi Kurdistan. It is noteworthy that Yerevan Kurdish Studies, which was one of the centers of Soviet Kurdish studies and gave this area of Oriental studies several bright scientists, avoided the Kurdish problem in Turkey.

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Russian (Moscow) Turkologists have hardly studied this topic. If numerous monographs and articles were published on the history of the Kurds and the problem of the Iraqi Kurds, the Kurds of Turkey remained out of their sight. Most of the studies on Turkey did not contain any information about the Kurdish problem, although since the founding of the Republic of Turkey, this particular problem has been important for this country, affecting all its spheres. M. A. Gasratyan was actually the only orientalist scholar who regularly published works on the Kurdish problem of Turkey, the national liberation War, since the mid-1950s. the struggle in Northern Kurdistan, the real situation of the Kurds, the attitude of the Turkish authorities towards them.

M. A. Gasratyan is the author of dozens of scientific articles and several fundamental monographs on the Kurdish problem in Turkey, as well as references to state authorities.

M. A. Gasratyan was one of the first in the world of Kurdish studies to study the Turkish legislation (from the 20s to the 90s of the XX century) concerning Kurds, prohibiting the Kurdish identity and aimed at their forced assimilation.

He paid much attention to the Kurdish uprisings of the 1920s and 1930s. While researching the Sheikh Said uprising, he criticized Turkish historians and the Turkish authorities, who claimed that the uprising was a robbery of wild tribes, that its goal was to restore the caliphate, it was reactionary in nature and inspired by the intrigues of the British. M. A. Gasratyan believed that despite the fact that the Sheikh Said uprising was not supported in other parts of Kurdistan and by some tribes even in Turkey itself, it was popular, since most of the population of Turkish Kurdistan, all social strata of Kurdish society participated in it, and it, like all subsequent uprisings in Turkish Kurdistan, had a liberating character.

The Ararat uprising, according to M. A. Gasratyan, showed a relatively high level of political maturity of the Kurds, although it was inferior in scope to the Sheikh Said uprising. The uprising near Ararat developed under the banner of an independent Kurdish republic. It was led both militarily and politically by the Hoibun organization, which included representatives of the Kurdish intelligentsia, the patriotic part of the feudal nobility and the commercial bourgeoisie.

Of particular interest in Gasratyan's works is the analysis of the situation in Turkish Kurdistan in the 60-80s of the XX century. It is this time that is one of the most important in the modern history of Kurdistan, as it marked the beginning of the processes that are currently taking place. No one in the world of Kurdish studies, except M. A. Gasratyan, has studied this period of the Kurdish liberation movement in Turkish Kurdistan in such detail. The activities of Kurdish patriots, in particular Kurdish intellectuals, including members of the then popular Kurdistan Democratic Party, were also the subject of the scientist's research.

Gasratyan correctly noted that the government's policy after the transition to a multiparty system "did not differ much from the policy under a one-party system. Only the forms of assimilation of the Kurds have changed somewhat. If earlier the main emphasis was placed on administrative and military violence, on the brutal suppression of popular discontent, on the mass eviction of Kurds from their homes, etc., now propaganda and special training methods have been added to all this."

In his opinion, a new stage in the Kurdish movement began in the late 1960s. Along with underground Kurdish political parties, legal youth organizations and societies began to emerge. In particular, on the initiative of the Kurdish faction of the Workers ' Party of Turkey, in August 1969, the Revolutionary Cultural Centers of the East (RKOV, DDKO) were created, which covered all the main cities and large settlements of Turkish Kurdistan. Established in Ankara, Istanbul, as well as in Diyarbakir and other cities of Eastern Anatolia, the RCOV joined the unformed federation of independent organizations of Kurdish students and intellectuals, which had about 20 thousand members.

M. A. Gasratyan also analyzed in detail the activities of the Kurdish national liberation movement in the 1970s. As the scientist wrote, " despite all the opposition, the national democratic movement in Turkish Kurdistan took on a broad scale by the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s." By this time, a number of Kurdish political parties were operating in the country in illegal and semi-legal conditions. M. A. Gasratyan noted that some Kurdish organizations in the late 1970s and early 1980s began to create underground militant groups that resisted the Turkish authorities.

M. A. Gasratyan was the only one in the world of Kurdish studies who analyzed the activities and program positions of political parties in the 1970s and 1980s. His work in this field, thanks to his deep analysis and good knowledge of the North Kurdistan political scene, is still relevant today.

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Despite the dominance of Marxism-Leninism in Soviet science, he was not at all influenced by it. In his works, there are almost no references to the classics of Marxism-Leninism. When analyzing a number of Kurdish parties, for example, he very aptly noted that although these parties claim to be Marxist-Leninist, this is just ordinary rhetoric, and the main thing for them is Kurdish nationalism.

M. A. Gasratyan has gained a great reputation in the world of Kurdish studies through his many years of activity. His works are the main ones in the bibliography on the Kurdish problem in Turkey for the entire XX century. M. A. Gasratyan's works have been translated into Turkish, Kurdish, Arabic, English and Armenian.

M. A. Gasratyan has also gained deep respect in the Kurdish world. For many years, he worked on the Kurdish problem, together with the Kurds, with the Kurdish political parties and members of the national liberation movement, he experienced all the zigzags and twists and turns of the Kurdish problem. He was a great and unselfish friend of the Kurds, having devoted a quarter of his life to studying them. M. A. Gasratyan not only as a scholar studied the Kurdish problem, including showing the anti-Kurdish discriminatory policy of the Turkish authorities. He advocated the rights of the Kurdish people, in particular their basic right - the right of self-determination, condemned anti-Kurdish actions at a time when the Kurds had very few friends, and the voice of an authoritative professor meant a lot to them.

MAIN WORKS OF M. A. GASRATYAN ON KURDISH STUDIES

Politika turk'skikh pravyashchikh krugov v otnoshenii k kurdskomu naseleniyu (1924 - 1939) [The policy of the Turkish ruling circles in relation to the Kurdish population (1924 - 1939)]. Kratkiej poshki Instituta narodov Azii AN SSSR. XXX. 1961.pp. 120-137.

On the policy of the ruling circles of Turkey in the national question / / Modern problems of Turkey, Moscow, 1963. pp. 129-144.

On the Kurdish problem in modern Turkey. IV AN. M., 1969. N5(96). pp. 92-101.

The Kurdish problem in Turkey (1924-1939). IV AN. M., 1975. N 6 (169). 170 p.

The Kurdish Question in Turkey (from the beginning of the Kemalist movement to the Lausanne Conference) / / Countries and Peoples of the Middle East. VII. Kurdish studies. Yerevan, 1975. pp. 43-70.

[Monograph based on the materials of the doctoral dissertation] Kurd issue in Turkey after the Second World War / / Special Bulletin of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 1980. N4 (211). p. 193.

Kurdish political parties operating in Kurdistan / / Spec. byull. IV AN. M., 1980. N4(211).

Kurd movement of Turkey / / Special Bulletin. IVAN. M., 1980. N5.

Kurdish political and public organizations that operated in Western Europe in the 70s / / Special Bulletin. IV AN. M., 1980. N4(211).

Sovremennoe sostoyanie kurdskogo voprosa (Turkeyi) [Current state of the Kurdish issue (Turkey)]. IV AN. M., 1981. N 2. p. 5-57 (sovm. with others).

On the situation of Kurds in modern Turkey / / National Question in the countries of the East. M " 1982. pp. 217-228.

K politike voennogo rezhima v kurdskom voprosu [On the policy of the military regime in the Kurdish issue]. IV AN. 1983. N 2. P. 64-73.

The Kurdish Uprising of 1925: (the Sheikh Said uprising) / / Countries and peoples of the Middle East. Yerevan, 1985, vol. 13, pp. 40-67.

In: The Kurdish Movement in Modern and Contemporary Times, Moscow, 1987. Author of sections: The Kurdish Question in Turkey in 1918 - 1923, pp. 87-101; The Sheikh Said Uprising, pp. 119-132; The Uprising in the Ararat region (1927-1931), pp. 143-148; The Uprising in Turkey in 1918 - 1923. Dersim (1936-1938). p. 158-164; The Kurdish question and the situation of Kurds in Turkey (after World War II). p. 186-194; The new rise of the Kurdish movement after the 1960 coup d'etat in Turkey. p. 228-237; Strengthening of punitive measures in Turkish Kurdistan. p. 238-244; Activation of the Kurdistan Regional Government. Kurd movements and increased repression in Turkish Kurdistan, pp. 257-266.

New Turkish Constitution and the Kurdish question / / Turkey: History and Modernity, Moscow, 1988, pp. 89-99.

Kurds of Turkey in modern times. Yerevan, 1990. 300 p.

Turkish legislation and Kurds / / Scientific and practical conference "Kurdistan at the crossroads of history and politics", Moscow, 1994, pp. 57-67.

The Kurdish problem in Turkey (1986-1995). Moscow, 2001. 240 p.

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