Our invited guest for this interview is a very dear and a very respectable person to all Tatar people - writer, essayist, scholar - historian, researcher, Ph.D., a prominent public figure, chairwoman of the party "Ittifak", one of the leaders of the Tatar political movement and political opposition in Tatarstan, Ms Fauzya Bayramova.
Ms Bayramova is an author of over 40 books, a large number of historical articles and essays. In 1986 she was admitted to the Union of Soviet Writers, and from 1990 to 1995 she was elected as deputy of the Supreme Council of Republic of Tatarstan. She is a member of the executive committee of the Worldwide Tatar Congress. All the activities of Ms Fauzya Bayramova are extremely versatile and productive. Today's conversation with her will reveal only a certain fraction of this extraordinary woman's peronality and image. Ms Bayramova is an active public figure, and mother of two children, who are is also highly educated scientists.
Ms Bayramova, the main content of your works on history is related to the history of Tatar people. When, how and why did you choose this direction?
-I started my career as a journalist in a local newspaper, half a century ago. In the early 80s I began writing some fictional literature as well, but my works were not based on historical themes from the beginning. I started approaching the history of Tatars during the same period, through the forbidden book of the Russian scientist Mikhail Khudyakov, "Sketches on the History of Kazan Khanate." It was printed in Kazan in 1923, and when Khudyakov was declared as an enemy of the nation shot in Leningrad in 1936, the whole edition of this book was destroyed, there was only one book remaining in the Lenin State Library of Kazan. One copy of this book fell into my hands and it turned my whole world view. "The battle was over - wrote Khudiakov the capture of Kazan Russian in 1552. - The city was made a terrible massacre, as commanders ordered to make a total extermination of all men ... All the male population of the huge city of Kazan was exterminated ... This monstrous massacre of the residents captured in Kazan was one of the worst pages Tatar history ... "and I saw the tragedy of my people ... I saw how many lies there are in the official science in relation to the Tatars ... I decided to devote myself to the discovery of the real history of Tatar people. It was the 80s of the last century. At first, I decided to return the good name of Michael Khudyakov in science, so I wrote about him two nonfiction books, as well as a thesis work, all devoted to the history of Mikhail Georgievich Khudyakov ...
What difficulties did you encounter on your way to acheving your goal?
-When I was working on my books about Khudyakov, there hasn't been any particular difficulty nor obstacles, if you don't count the fact that there was no single monograph treating this subject not only in the URSS but even in Russia afterwards.
But when I started digging deeper in the history of Tatars from the most ancient times, when I started to raise questions about the forced baptism of Tatars, when I started to separately examine and report on the history of Siberian Tatars - I ran into trouble from the part of the mainstream science, from the part of the authorities, and even from some of Tatar historians. And this was because in the official science all the information concerning Tatars had been already divided - here's the loyal Bulgarian period, there's the aggressive Golden Horde period, and there's everything else, yet we are all united forever - one nation, one language, one religion ... As historian, as national politician and as a writer, I didn't agree with this interpretation, because I knew that this was not the real case. As before the Bulgarian period there were several golden eras of Tatars - those are the Scythian, the Hunnish, the Sarmatian and the Saks periods of great Turkic civilizations. The fact that the city of Bulgar was not destroyed by Tatars but by Russians in 1431 ... That the Golden Horde was a progressive, democratic Tatar state; that the Russian state was built on the base and on the ruins of the great Golden Horde ... That in place of Tatar cities - there are now Russian cities, and in place of mosques - Orthodox churches dominate; that a great part of Tatars were forcibly baptized and turned into composants of the Russian nation, as Russians.
What are the main discoveries that you've made while collecting the historical material about Tatar people? What struck you most?
-During the last ten years, I've been carefully studying the history of Siberian Tatars, I wrote several popular science books on this subject, and I also published my historical novel "Kuchum Khan." During this period, I was working in the archives of Tobolsk, Tara, Tyumen, Omsk, Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Perm, Kurgan and in other cities of Siberia, I've been in almost all cities of Western Siberia, from Surgut till Salekhard, also in regions ranging from Sakhalin to Altai and Ural. Everywhere I go, I look for the living bridges of history, that is to say, I'm looking for the Tatars who are associated with their own roots to the ancient history. And I find them everywhere! There, where Tatar people once lived, where they built cities and administrated their states - they are still living there! In the Barabinsk steppes of the Novosibirsk region, in the dense forests of Krasnoyarsk and Perm regions, on the banks of Yenisei and Irtysh, of Ob and Ishim, in the swamps of the regions of Tobolsk and Omsk, in the mountains of Ural and Altai, starting from ancient times to the present day - Tatars are still living! Their most ancient genealogies-shejere are still preserved today with great care, they still know by heart their millenary epics poems, they can still show you the Scythian burial mounds behind their own homes, their historical memory is still alive .... When I've been studying the history of Siberian Tatars, I've come to a conclusion that the Tatar world began from there - from Siberia; and that there remained a huge reservoir of Scythian-Hunnish history; and that the language of the Siberian Tatars remains the most ancient Turkic start of the protatar matrix. That some of Siberian Tatar dastans more ancient than the epic poems Homer and that their stories are identical ... I've seen some Aryan burial mounds in Altai, that date 7000 years! In the south of the region of Chelyabinsk, I visited the monument of ancient Turkic civilization Archaim, I've been studying the Scythian burial mounds in the region of Kurgan, learning about the ancient stone balbals in the steppes of Tuva ... For me, definitely, it became clear that the ancient mounds of Siberia are the monuments of Turkic-Tatar civilizations! And I started writing about it all ... I wrote with arguments, making reference to some foreign scientists, to Russian scientists of past centuries ... Tatars were not only nomads on horseback, the've built hundreds of stone cities, castles and acropolis - from the coast of Pacific Ocean to Caucasus and Danube. They have created dozens of states and empires, like the Turkic Khaganate; the Bulgarian state; the Golden Horde; Kazan, Siberian, Astrakhan, Crimean, Kasimov Khanates; the Nogay Horde ... I've opened the Tatar code - the code of the great history of Tatars! And this is what we should be proud of, and that is what we should strive to ... I don't write for the scientists, nor for the academic debates; I write for my own folk, so that they know their history and be proud of it ... What's more, in my work, I strongly pay attention to the topics that concern the forced baptism of Tatars; for many years I've been examining the subject on the repressed Tatars, thus I wrote several books about it. In my works you could also find a large reservoir of studies on environmental issues, because I think it is very important geopolitical problem, along with the ecology of the soul ...
Why did you pay attention to the ecological state of the environment in which Tatars have been living?
-For me, the subject of ecology and environmental protection has always been a priority, because the most important things like health, beauty, harmony, and the future in general, all depend from the clean environment. Such beautiful, charming nature is the great gift that we received from the Almighty, and we should cherish it until the end of life on earth. And it's not in vain, perhaps, that my first literary work was called "Bolyn" ("meadow"), where not only the dramatic fate of the millennial agricultural meadows in favor of the officials-meliorators is reflected, but also the fate of the solitary souls of people of that era, dismissed from the society for nonconformity... To me, as to a writer, the theme of ecology of the nature and the theme of ecology of the soul have always walked together side by side and were equally vulnerable... Thus I published my early stories with symbolic names, such as "Kül balygy" ("Fish lake"), "Kanatsyz akcharlaklar" ("Gull without wings") about a lonely soul of man under conditions of social realism - and it was in the 80's of the last century ... It's also us ... Then came the 90s, the era of glasnost, and the monstrous crimes of the Soviet empire in relation to its citizens began to reveal. After the Chernobyl tragedy there were other nuclear disasters on the land of Russia, one of which was the accident in the nuclear plant "Mayak" in 1957. Since 1948, the plant was producing plutonium for the first Soviet atomic bomb, from the time it stores 1 billion curies of radioactive waste. That plant has undergone numerous accidents with release of fatal radiation into the environment. As I said, the largest and the most terrible accident at the "Mayak" nuclear plant was the explosion on the storage of radioactive waste, the dose of radioactive contamination has exceeded 200 times Chernobyl, the radioactive cloud covered the regions of Chelyabinsk, Sverdlovsk, Kurgan and Tyumen. 217 settlements were detected in the contaminated area with a radius of 300 kilometers, where over 270 thousand people were irradiated. However, 42 inhabited localities and 12 thousand people had been resettled. At the same time, large Tatar villages, each with a population of 3-4 thousand people, were left in the zone of death, and they are slowly dying today. It's been 20 years since I began studying this subject, and in 2003, the World Congress of Tatars, of which I am a member of the executive committee, began discussing this issue. Then we, the whole delegation - scientists, writers, lawyers and journalists, were all sent to the "zone of death "to examine the situation of Tatars living in the radioactive lands. We were in the Tatar village of the Chelyabinsk region, including Muslyumovo, Karabulak, Kunashak, Ust-Bagryak and other places, where we met people, visited hospitals, studied their archives, participated in the courts in defense of Tatars who were exposed to radiation... After this I've visited the same places for several times, I've been carefully studying the medical history of the Tatars living there. I was working with the archival materials of the nuclear plant "Mayak",and I even attended a closed nuclear city of Ozersk, where the that nuclear plant is situated. On these trips the World Congress of Tatars helped us very much, with the help of the Congress, we were able to deliver medicine to sick people for many thousands of rubles, books, computers ... After these trips I wrote a book "Nuclear Archipelago or nuclear genocide against the Tatars" (2005). This book was translated into German, and it came out in Germany under the title "Der Nukleare Archipl oder der atomare Genozid an den Tataren" (2006). In 2007 the book "Tatar Karabolka - 5 years in the embrace of death." was published. I also wrote an artwork - novel on this tragic topic - "Karabolak" in two parts (2005). With a book in German in 2007, I participated in exhibitions of the Leipzig Book Fair, I was in the Reichstag, met deputies- environmentalists there, held meetings in many cities in Germany. Also with the book "Nuclear Archipelago or nuclear genocide against the Tatars" I was in Moscow, handed the book to many European embassies, wrote to all authorities ... As a result, the Tatar village of Muslyumovo was moved away from the contaminated area to a cleaner place, at least after half a century later, while Tatar Karabolka was left in its old place and almost disappearing now ... In this village, before the atomic explosion, there lived up to 5,000 people, and now there are only about 200 of inhabitants, all suffering from cancer.
Your persistent actions related to the rescue of people who have fallen victims of an ecological catastrophe have gaven a positive result - about three thousand people from the area of radiation were resettled. Nowadays, if one person saves the life of another - this is considered as a feat. How did you feel when you've achieved such great success in saving over thousand of lives?
-There was a silent joy, as we have not published this support from our side, and the citizens of Muslyumov weren't even aware of the reasons for which they were resettled ... It was a great project and a great help to the World Congress of Tatars and my including. But at the same time I knew that many of these people have chronic exposure, that they not only themselves but also their descendants would be sick for 40 generations, that they - the Tatars, labeled atom ... Today in the village Muslyumovo every fourth child - mutant, ie, genetically crippled. One in five children suffering from heart disease or respiratory tract. Every sixth child suffers from diseases of the gastrointestinal tract. 70 per cent of pupils is defective mental development, they do not develop brain or there is water. Even among those born after 1997 in the blood has an atomic label - exposure ... My main concern - as an example of radiation exposure Tatars to show the world the danger of nuclear plants for all mankind. My main requirement - to stop further activities "Mayak" preserve nuclear production. Save others. Russia has become the world's nuclear dump at the "Mayak" imported spent nuclear fuel from 22 countries. It also has 231 nuclear dumping, in 17 special storage dumped liquid radioactive waste ... This is a very dangerous place for all mankind, and Chelyabinsk meteorite that has recently exploded in the 80-kilometers from the "Mayak" in the air - was a warning from God ...
In recent years, among the Turkic population is increasing interest in the ancient beliefs of the Tatars - Tengriism, or rather, religion Ak-jan. In this religion at a high level of spiritual beliefs put respect for nature - mother. What do you think, could our native Tatar beliefs help restore the environment, it is no secret that our eyes the whole environment gradually "technologically" turns into unrecoverable toxic waste?
-Tengriism is a thing of the past, from the childhood Turkic peoples, including, and Tatars. However, Tengriism Tatars did not have a pronounced pagan Kүk-Tәңre (Kuk Tengri) for them was a heavenly deity. Tatars did not worship nature, rocks, rivers, for them the supreme deity was the blue sky, they thought that the main force is there. And for that, they took it easy and Islam, Allah Almighty to them was the same ... And Tatars realized that the Creator, the Creator and the sky and the earth, and this beautiful nature, and the people themselves is Allah. Tatars in Islam more than a thousand years, Islam, they had become a way of life, a worldview, a tradition and culture ... They struggled for centuries to preserve the religion, thousands died along the way, Islam they have at the genetic level, blood ... Even those who are not yet in compliance with all the requirements of Islam, he knows that there is Allah Almighty, that we came from there and return to the same ... As for the protection of nature - a believer will just be the first of its advocate, because both nature and ourselves, and our health - it Amanat-mandate of Allah! And for this we will have to answer to Allah.
You are currently member of the World Tatar Congress. What questions would you like to make for consideration with regard to improving the lives of Tatar people in the framework of international cooperation?
- It's been 12 years since I've become a member of the executive committee of the World Congress of Tatars. I am raising the question about the creation of a joint Worldwide commission of protection of rights of Tatar people, affiliated with the Congress. In 2003, a commission was created on a voluntary basis, but it certainly could not work out as we wanted. Now that the Congress exists, the organization of the European Tatars had been created, but they never ever raise questions about protecting the rights of Tatars. We, the Tatars, have our weakest spot, which is advocacy, we don't have a single human rights protecting organization neither in Europe nor in Russia, not even in Tatarstan. So go no further, of course. Have to apply it to Moscow, then to the European human rights defenders, and they Tatar question is not so clear and close ... We've got the name of the Tatar people at the international level are the leaders of Tatarstan. officials, and they are in the framework of Russian. Abroad know very little Tatar history, current problems of the Tatars. In the future will need independent media, websites, magazines, books, promoting Tatars.
Based on the fact that you stand a stable position of Muslims, have you had any difficulties in the manifestation of your activity as a woman in the Tatar Muslim society?
-I've been long standing in opposition against the whole regime and system, but some people, including religious figures, always push away all the oppositionists. I've been participating in politics since a long time ago; in 1990-1995 I was deputy of the Supreme Council of Tatarstan; in 1990 I participated in the adoption of the Declaration of Independence of Tatarstan, in the organization of a referendum on this issue in 1992; I've created the independent Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Tatarstan by myself in 1992 .. . When Tatarstan stood before the loss of its independence in 1991, I announced my political hunger strike, straight on the Freedom Square, a strike that lasted 14 days and ended with our victory - the Russian President wasn't elected in Tatarstan! And I've always been fighting for the independence of Tatarstan, for the human rights, for the rights of Tatar people, including Muslims. And people know about it, there is always respect and understanding among the Tatar people, and this is the most important thing.
Which issues will your future literary career will be dedicated to?
-Currently I am writing a book about Chingiz Aitmatov's mother, the world-famous writer, whose mother was Tatar. In order to collect the material for this future book, I've been to Kyrgyzstan, worked in the archives of the city of Kirov, visited Ms Nagima's ancestral homeland - the village of Machkara in the Kukmor region of Tatarstan. The subject of this book is not simple, it is very responsible and difficult. Indeed, there are some points of contention, but there are more positive points rather than negative. What's more, there is another book waiting on line; the book about Abdrashit Ibragimov, a Siberian Tatar, an outstanding religious leader - the founder of political Islam in Russia, in 1905 organized the Muslim party "Ittifak", the publisher of many newspapers and magazines in Kazan, St. Petersburg, and in Turkey Japan, on the first clutch of Japan before the war ... My job as historian and as writer is to show Tatar historical figures for the whole world, to raise the spirit of the people through the examples of these outstanding personalities, to create a gallery of the Tatar rulers of mind and the fighters for freedom, like Khan Kuchum, as Batyrsha as Abdrashit Ibragimov and as others .... I have written 40 books devoted to my people. As a political and social activist, I've outspoken opponent of terror and violence, for the progressive development and a bright future for Tatars.
Today is to thank Fauzya Bayramova for frank conversation and wish you every success in your life, and creativity.
Fauzya Bayramova,
Chairwoman of the National Assembly of the Tatars,
Chairwoman of the Tatar National Independence Party "Ittifak"
writer, candidate of historical sciences. (07.01.15.)
Conversation held by T.Fatkulina.
