Sons of Alaş
Alaş Urpağı Sons of Alash | |
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Slogan | "We are the children of Alash" |
Nation | Turkestan, (Russian) Qazaqstan |
Founded | 1991 |
Headquarters | Bayqoņır, Turkestan |
Current Membership | NUMBER OF MEMBERS |
Representation | 3/588 |
Key People | KEY PEOPLE |
Political Outlook | Qazaq-reunificationist & secessionist |
The Sons of Alash (Qazaq: Alaş Urpağı) are a political party in Russian Qazaqstan and Turkestan.
They are the most vociferous proponents of the idea of reunification of the two halves of Qazaqstan, and furthermore, they believe in "Qazaqstan for the Qazaqs". This mostly means the secession of the two halves of Qazaqstan from Russia and Turkestan respectively and the establishment of a unitary, independent Qazaq state.
Their ideology thus combines elements of pan-Turkism with domestic nationalist sentiment, and their voting and agitation agendas reflect this. Sometimes they campaign very closely with parties such as the Party of the Turan and the Transnational Party, other times they vote with their opposites, the Federal Party and other similar groups.
The party's name "Sons of Alash" refers to the legendary ancestor of all of the three Qazaq hordes (tribal unions): Alash. The English translation "Sons" for Urpaq is actually a bit of a misnomer; the word more precisely translates as "Generation", "Descendants" or "Offspring".
The party members typically fly a "Unified Qazaqstan" flag combining elements of the flags of the Russian republic and the Turkestani province. A typical example is shown below; other colour variants have also been noted - a version with a red field is particularly favoured by socialist-leaning Qazaq reunionists.