Shafaq News:
Excerpts from an article about the Kurdish press published in the ( Alahali ) journal in April 5, 1959:

We have said that the special circumstances of Kurdistan and the control of colonization in these parts were  the most effective hindrance of the development of Kurdish culture and Kurdish press as a result. We found that more newspapers were printed outside Kurdistan. Kurdish newspapers appeared in the Kurdistan of Iran, and also shows us that any Kurdish newspaper did not come out of Syria since a long time, and now Kurdish newspapers come out from Iraq and the Soviet Union.
It appeared to us quite obvious that a large number - somewhat - from Kurdish newspapers and magazines - political and literary - have been approved in the days of the current provision, and the numbers of which have been issued, and there are waiting for publication after the elimination of part of the difficulties and  restricting obstacles that stood  in their way , printing problems and the scarcity of the market and the problem of the different dialects of Kurdish and dark illiteracy in Kurdistan Iraq. The problem of printing is the main problem these days, and more printing presses in Iraq is an Arab printing. It is clear that there are differences between writing Arabic and Kurdish - Arabic script - there are Kurdish characters which are not found in the Arabic language. As there is use of the word rather than vowels in the Kurdish Language and printing needs to a number of these characters that are used instead of the vowels , and there are signs of that are placed on some of the characters, which gives a change of different voices. Such  possibility,  is not available , but in the number of few presses of Iraq, and the printing presses to do not have so far only the possibility of printing magazines, monthly or bimonthly, or the publication of some books, and there is no printing press in Iraq now able to print a daily Kurdish newspaper, and the problem printing the other is the lack of printing large Kurdish cities and the ignorance of workers of presses in Baghdad, in  the Kurdish language. The problem of depression market printed the Kurdish It stems from what we have said of the division of Kurdistan and the different dialects of Kurdish, and then blackness illiteracy in Kurdistan, has shown us that any newspaper or publication Kurd prevents both Iran and Turkey and Syria. In Iran's government encourages some Kurdish books coming out their direction, and political and linguistic guidance,  . Political Directive is to have these books carrying ideas to serve the government and do not hurt colonial interests. The linguistic guidance that such books written in Kurdish serve the philosophy preached by the rulers of Iran, which is that the two Kurdish and Persian are two branches of people called the people of Iran - the languages ​​of Persian and Kurdish are the two branches of the Iranian language, or that the Kurdish language is a dialect of Persian dialects. In Turkey, it is known that the heirs of Mustafa Kamal Ataturk because of the existence of millions of Kurdish people in Kurdistan Supplement Turkey, but still they say – they are  Turks -, but they are  kind of decadent mountain people ! Of course, they are  not be allowed under the rule of an agent of colonialism to access to any newspaper in their own language, of any kind. As in Syria, I do not think there is a need to explain the situation of hundreds of thousands of Kurds, where   the mere existence of a Kurdish book - A B – the owner is taken to jail, without the knowledge of his fate – imagine -. The different dialects and the prevalence of illiteracy have led to the spread of non-Kurdish press, but we can say that the spread of education and the literary Kurdish-language standard used now in Iraq will help in the spread of the Kurdish press.

Prepared by: Adam Mohamed

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