Bachtyar Ali's Speech to Protesters in Seray Azady (Sulaimany) 25/32011

Translated from Kurdish by: San Saravan

The authority does not know the name of the executioners because they are not one, two or three, but many, many of them. In any land where the numb...er of the executors increases, knowing their names is worthless.

The authority also does not know the name of your martyrs because there are many, many of them. In any land where the number of the martyrs increases, knowing their names is worthless.

The authority cannot answer your questions because there are many of them. In any land where there are that many questions, the answers will be worthless.

My dears, it is a surprise to all of us when, day after day, the authority has chosen not to listen to you rather than to listen. Instead of looking at you, it looks at itself. Instead of thinking about you, it only thinks about itself; in any land, if the authority only thinks about itself, then the authority will be worthless.

The authority cannot see you and does not want to see you because you are the beauty while it is the place where the beauty dies.

The authority does not want to understand you because you are the representative of the era, and the authority is not able to grasp you. The authority does not understand you because you are alive and the authority has died.

My dears, you are the symbol of renewal while the authority is the symbol of decay; you are on the way towards giving birth to a new era while the authority is withering. You have come while it is going. Like the sun, you are rising while the authority is setting. Nothing on earth can bring you and the authority together only coincidence. It is coincidence that your spirit bloomed on the same earth as people who do not care about your appeals. The authority bears no resemblance to you. Not bearing resemblance to it should be your life slogan. You should observe the authority more consciously to avoid becoming like it. We know the authority hates the different voice; this should be a greater incentive for you to love the different voice. I know it cares nothing about the future of this country, but you will need to care. The freedom they do not understand, you should try more deeply and clearly to understand. My dears, the only way that you can change this life is by not resembling this authority. Today you are the mirror in which the authority can see itself. Apart from you this country has no other mirror to show our true political history. You are only an eye through which the authority can see itself. If any authority does not want to see itself through your eyes, it is blind. Our society has had enough of your snobby and aristocratic attitude, which does not want to know what is going on around it or what people are asking for.

The authority understands things very late, because the nature of its thinking is that time is still in its favor, while history demonstrates that throughout the world it remains in the hands of the people to make history. Time will be on your side because you are the only power that does not decay, that does not pass and that is infinite. Wagering on time is the worst bet ever that the authority can make against people. Because you are the power that in the future will talk and the authority is the power that slept in the past. The most dangerous authority in the world is the one that thinks tomorrow is not its own day.

My dears, the authority does not want to go through its history. If any authority does not want to go through its history, it does not deserve the future. The authority does not understand that your standing here is a stand for hopes and infinite optimism that will never age. I am sure that what brings us together is a dream and this dream entombed many of the tyrants in earlier times; what brings us together is longer-lived than all the heads of the authorities of the world. Whoever bets on killing your hopes and diminishing your optimism, bets on a losing horse.

Keep going. You are an eternal power. You are the only element that emerged outside of time, place and aging because you are carrying an eternal hope, which is the hope of freedom.