Peri-Khan Sofieva ( az, Pərixan Sofiyeva, ka, ფერიხან სოფიევა; 1884 – 1953) was the first Muslim woman elected to office.

Biography

Sofiyeva was born in 1884 in the Georgian town of Karajala, then part of the Georgian region of

Tiflis Governorate The Tiflis Governorate was a province ('' guberniya'') of the Caucasus Viceroyalty of the Russian Empire with its administrative center in Tiflis (present-day Tbilisi). In 1897, it constituted 44,607 sq. kilometres in area and had a population ...

, in the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

. She was the only girl in a family of eight. At the time of the Russian Empire, Sofia was the head of her brothers, thus gaining popularity. With the loan taken from a bank, she opened an orphanage in the village.The world's first democratically elected Muslim woman was from Georgia
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Political career

Independent Georgia

After the February 1917 Revolution, the transition from the South Caucasus began with a reform of the local governments. On 26 May 1918,

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

declared its independence. In local elections later in the year, Sofiyeva was elected to be a councillor in Karajala. Although Sofiyeva was an active person, very little is known about her life.

Invasion of the Soviet Union

According to Rashgan Sofieva, the wife of Peri-Khan Sofieva's nephew, Sofiyeva hated the Bolsheviks and the Soviet government. Because of the

Great Purge The Great Purge or the Great Terror (russian: Большой террор), also known as the Year of '37 (russian: 37-й год, translit=Tridtsat sedmoi god, label=none) and the Yezhovshchina ('period of Nikolay Yezhov, Yezhov'), was General ...

, she walked around with her old

Mauser C96 The Mauser C96 (''Construktion 96'') is a semi-automatic pistol that was originally produced by German arms manufacturer Mauser from 1896 to 1937. Unlicensed copies of the gun were also manufactured in Spain and China in the first half of the 2 ...

pistol, after eight brothers were executed and buried in one of the common graves because they came from a rich family and were considered traitors.

Death

Sofiyeva died in 1953, victim of a

heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which may tr ...

WHAT WE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT AZERBAIJANI FELLOW CITIZENS
/ref> after hearing of the detention of one of her nephews.

External links

İlk müsəlman, azərbaycanlı qadın deputat - "Kişi Pəri" kimdir? (Biography in BBC Azerbaijan)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sofieva, Peri-Khan 1884 births 1953 deaths Georgian Azerbaijanis Politicians from the Russian Empire Democratic Republic of Georgia 20th-century women politicians from Georgia (country) 20th-century politicians from Georgia (country) People from Tiflis Governorate