Mechabad (Persian. مorate & پیرالشicle – mahâbâd, Kurd. مەھا# – mehabad, Azerb. Məhəbad) is a city in Iran in the provinces of West Azerbaijan, the administrative center of Shahrestan Mechabad, considered the capital of Iranian Kurdistan.
Most of the population are Kurds. Mahabad is located south of Lake Urmia, in a narrow valley 1,300 meters above sea level, in the northwestern part of Iran.

General information
Population 162 thousand people. Airport, university (“Mahabad Islamic University”). The city is located at an altitude of 1300 meters and is known for its healthy temperate climate and healing mineral springs.
Mahabad is the cultural center of Iranian Kurdistan. The dialect of Mahabad, belonging to the Sorani dialect, is the literary language of the Iranian Kurds. In Mahabad, such well-known poets among Kurds as Amin (Said Mohammed Amin Sheikho-al-Islam Mukri, 1920-1986), Khazhar (Abdurrahman Sharafkan, 1920-1990) and others were born and wrote.

History
At the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. e. the area of ​​Mahabad was the center of the kingdom of Manna. Then it was part of Media. Rock-cut tombs and other monuments of the Sassanid era have also been preserved in the vicinity of the city. The city itself until the 20th century bore the name Soyugbulag. The city was founded in the 16th century by Budak-Sultan, the leader of the Kurdish Mukri tribe, who established his residence in Sablaq; The principality of Mukri lasted until the middle of the 19th century, and since then the region has been known among the Kurds as “Mukri Kurdistan”.
In 1609-1610, the area became the arena of the struggle of the Mukrinians, led by the “Golden Hand Khan”, against Shah Abbas I – events sung in the Kurdish epic “Dym-Dym Fortress”. After the victory, Shah Abbas subjected the area to destruction and evicted many of the Mukrinians to Khorasan.
At the end of 1912, Soujbulak was occupied by the Russians and, with the nominal preservation of the sovereignty of the shah and the power of the local governor, the Russian vice-consul became the actual power in the city. During the First World War, he worked several times with either Russians or Turks; these years remained in the memory of the population as a time of terrible disaster.
In 1935, the city was destroyed by a flood, rebuilt and given its current name.

In 1941, it was occupied by the Red Army, but soon abandoned, so that Mukri Kurdistan turned out to be a neutral territory between the Soviet and British zones of occupation. In 1946 – the capital Mahabad Republic, proclaimed on January 1, 1946 by Muhammad Kazi. The republic lasted until March 1947, when the USSR stopped supporting the republic, the Shah’s troops entered Mahabad and hanged Qazi, the other leaders of the republic were also arrested and executed.
During the Iranian Revolution of 1979, it was controlled by the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan. September 3, 1979 bombed and captured by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards.
In the summer of 2005, Mahabad became the scene of new Kurdish unrest. In the city, a young Kurdish activist Shwan Kaderi, who was considered one of the organizers of the demonstrations, was killed (according to the official version while trying to escape during the arrest); his body was tied to a military truck and dragged through the city. The response of the Kurds was a mass uprising (July 26, which covered not only Mahabad, but also 10 cities; state institutions were destroyed. Up to 100,000 soldiers were brought into the region, a state of emergency and a curfew were declared. In October, there were new demonstrations and clashes with the police, the reason for which was the death sentence of two young Kurds accused of killing a police officer.