The new balance in the South Caucasus following Azerbaijan’s victory in the Second Karabakh War, steps toward opening the Zangezur Corridor, and Türkiye’s successful operations in northern Syria have deeply unsettled Iran. Iranian writers, academics, and analysts have been voicing this unease openly at different levels for some time. Expressed particularly harshly by media outlets and relatively junior officials, it rose again after protests erupted following Mahsa Amini’s beating by the Guidance Patrols, also known as the morality police, and her subsequent collapse and death. Some claims went as far as alleging that Türkiye had organized the unrest to open the Zangezur Corridor.
The alliance between Azerbaijan and Türkiye and Azerbaijan’s liberation of its occupied territories in a month and a half surprised Iran. Iranian officials, who sent mixed messages from the outset, have increasingly favored Armenia in recent months and openly declared their support. Analyses began portraying Türkiye’s Azerbaijan policy as a “devious” attempt to strengthen its hand in the South Caucasus. A leaked audio recording of Abolfazl Zohrehvand is particularly revealing. A former spokesperson for Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and ambassador to Afghanistan and Italy, he also served on the nuclear negotiating team. In the recording, he says Iran acted mistakenly during the Karabakh War and that rapprochement between Türkiye and Armenia works against Iran. He explicitly states that a possible road link between Nakhchivan and Türkiye would harm Iran by depriving it of leverage over Türkiye. The recording also contains insulting remarks about President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Türkiye, and Azerbaijan. In a subsequent interview, with a photograph of Erdoğan and Ilham Aliyev walking side by side as the background, Zohrehvand did not deny his words. He merely brushed them aside as remarks made in a different setting.
Türkiye’s rapprochement with Israel, the Azerbaijan–Israel alliance, and Türkiye’s steadily strengthening position in both Syria and the South Caucasus are central causes of Iran’s unease. Posts from social media accounts linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) use a harsh tone far removed from diplomatic language. They describe the Armenia–Iran border as a “red line” and warn against crossing it. Some analyses carried headlines such as “Baku’s Dangerous Game With Iran’s Red Line” and explicitly argued: “Türkiye and the Zionist regime must destroy the Armenia–Iran border to connect Türkiye with the Turkic world all the way to China.” The emphasis on Zionist support for pan-Turkism, and the association of Türkiye with it, is important. In the leaked recording, Zohrehvand similarly said: “The Turks have a Zionist mindset.” In addition to labels such as the “Turan Corridor” and “NATO Corridor,” various Iranian circles also call the Zangezur Corridor the “Zionist Corridor.”
The Amini Protests and Their Association With Türkiye
As demonstrations after Amini’s death unfolded, Iran increasingly viewed them as “separatist,” while perceptions of a threat from Türkiye also rose among the Iranian public. Although Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi explicitly targeted separatist Kurdish organizations such as Komala and PJAK, Iran has not overlooked “pan-Turkism” either. In an analysis, University of Tehran political scientist Hamid Ahmadi describes Azerbaijan as a project of Ottoman and Caucasian elites, tracing the process through to the establishment of the Organization of Turkic States. Any “pan-Turkist” movement can thus be linked to Türkiye. Combined with heightened threat perceptions following developments in the South Caucasus, this perspective has made the issue more open to exploitation than ever. The recently announced South Azerbaijan National Assembly, said to have been established by a group of Iranian Turks in Ankara, drew objections particularly from Iranian conservatives. Ali Akbar Raefipour, head of the conservative-aligned MASAF Institute, discussed the assembly on Iranian state television. He openly targeted Türkiye over the unrest, linking numerous incidents to it and saying Türkiye stood behind them as much as Western countries did. Support for the protests from Turkish artists and some NGOs also became a topic in Iran and contributed to Türkiye being targeted. The issue has moved beyond rhetoric, with allegations about events on the ground giving it another dimension. Footage broadcast by IRIB, apparently filmed in Tabriz, showed a Turkish flag laid on the ground and displayed as though it were evidence of a crime. Reports also said a group of military officers had been detained for promoting Turkism. Photographs of soldiers supporting Azerbaijan during the Second Karabakh War, making the wolf sign with the message “our side is clear,” are worth recalling here. Finally, an allegation emerged that sixteen-year-old Atilla Arfai had been detained on September 21 and severely tortured because his phone contained Turkish-language texts and a photograph of Atatürk.
An IRGC-aligned Telegram channel accused Türkiye of brazenly inciting young people in Iran’s northwestern provinces and supporting Iranian terrorists by sheltering them. It argued that Iranians should impose a form of boycott by not visiting Türkiye, alleging that Türkiye financed terrorism against Iran with money earned from Iranians. The post concluded: “Before every trip to Türkiye, the Iranian people would do well to consider that every lira they spend there contributes to the budget of terrorists who go to bed every night wishing for Iran’s destruction.”
Conclusion
Since the Revolution, Iran has positioned Türkiye as an identity-based “other” and, with varying intensity, expressed unease over its relations with Western countries and Israel. Anti-Türkiye rhetoric is therefore not new to the Iranian public. The changed balance after the Second Karabakh War appears to have intensified and transformed that unease. Nevertheless, Iran has not openly taken a confrontational position against Türkiye. The hostile commentary and analyses come from lower levels, not directly from the top of the state. Even if this rhetorical stance is unlikely to change in the future, the tendency of Iranian analysts to place Türkiye alongside NATO, the United States, Israel, and Saudi Arabia as a “foreign instigator” seeking to divide Iran deserves attention.
This article was first published by the Center for Iranian Studies (İRAM) on October 13, 2022.
Link: https://www.iramcenter.org/bir-dis-mihrak-olarak-turkiye-821