Hazara nationalism

Hazara nationalism is a movement that claims the Hazara people, an ethnic native to the Hazarajat region of Afghanistan, are a distinct nation and deserve a nation-state of their own. The movement propagates the view that Muslims are not a nation and that ethnic loyalty must surpass religious loyalty, though this view has been challenged by both the 1890s independence uprisings of Hazarajat and the systematic discrimination many Hazaras have historically faced within Afghanistan.

Hazara ethnicity and nationalism

Flag of Hazaristan

Hazara nationalism stems from lingual and ancestral roots in the Hazarajat region in the modern-day central Afghanistan.

The movement claims to receive considerable support from the Hazara diaspora in Australia, United Kingdom, Sweden, Norway, United States, Canada and other countries. Successive Pashtun-dominated Afghan governments have repeatedly made claims that the Hazara nationalists have received funding from Iran, despite the fact that the Hazara nationalists are against the Iranian regime, and have criticized the theocratic regime on many occasions for discrimination against the Hazara people in Iran. According to them, these accusations are the usual propaganda tactic that the Pashtun-dominated governments use against the Hazara people.

Modern Hazara nationalism

Hazara nationalism in its modern form began in the form of the Hazara Uprisings of 1880s and 1890s (Organisation for Unity of the Hazara) based in Hazarajat, led by Hazara elders and allies. The aim of the group was to establish political and constitutional reform in the Hazarajat region; and an end to the military despotism of Abdur Rahman Khan of the Barakzai dynasty for the eventual unification of all Hazara lands into an independent state. In 1985, simultaneously with the formation of the Hezbe Wahdat, Hazara intellectuals in Mazar-e Sharif, formed a nationalist organisation, called the Hazara Unity.