In Salmas at this time resided a notorious brigand by the name of Simkoo. He was undoubtedly the most dreaded, by the Persian authorities, of all the Kurdish chieftains of the Eastern Kurdistan, and was regarded as the strongest of them all. Through the game of diplomacy he had managed to be alternately now on the Persian side and then again on the Turkish side. At the time of the Russian occupation of the State of Azarbaijan, the notorious brigand had surprised his co-religionists, and fought on the side of the Allies as well. He was once captured by the Russian soldiers and taken to Tiflis as a prisoner. But before the collapse of Russia he had succeeded in gaining the favor of the Russian military authorities to secure his freedom, and to bring back with him a considerable supply of arms and ammunition, on the promise that he world use his available force against the Turks. After the Russians had completely withdrawn from Persia, Simkoo, so far as Persia was concerned, became supreme, and since the days of Shah Abbass, no monarch had exercised as great an authority over the boundary lands of the northwestern Persia. The Persian government, of which he was a subject, he had defied, as he could always defy; and so far as the Turks were concerned, he knew he could play the game again by telling them that he was forced into the service of Russia against his will. Simkoo had had one fear only, and that had always risen from the Assyrian marksmen of Targavar, even though they were inferior to his men in numbers. But now that the Assyrian warriors of the hills were also present in Persia, he had become a peaceful subject, and had apparently chosen to live out and far from his old nest of lawlessness in the mountains of Bradoost and Somaie. It was this man that the Persian authorities used as a tool in their hands for the assassination of Mar Shimon. And after he had committed the dastardly deed, he was told, if the Turks failed to make their appearance in Persia by that time, he could escape into the interior of the country and remain there unmolested.
Mar Shimon and his bodyguard of two hundred horsemen arrived in Salmas during the last week of February, 1918. He was welcomed by his own people, and by the Armenians as well. Even the Moslems of Salmas vied with the Christians in the bestowal of honors upon him. Shortly after his arrival he was visited by two emmisaries of the Persian authorities of Tabriz. They came to the Patriarch with that polished hyprocrisy which grows exclusively in the soil of Islam. They reminded him of the letter he had written several months before to the Tabriz authorities, expressing his good will toward the Persian government, and requesting of the latter that he and his people be allowed to reside in Persia as their temporary guests. They officially informed the Patriarch of the "deep appreciation" that was felt by the Persian authorities of the contents of his Beatitude's letter, and that how those authorities had been "glad to serve a humanitarian cause," by gladly opening the gates of their country, to give the Assyrian Christians a place of refuge. But, the emissaries added, inasmuch as the Persian authorities desired to see those boundary lands in perfect peace and tranquility, and inasmuch as they would no longer countenance any local Moslem agitations and uprisings against the Christians, they thought that it would be for the interest of peace, if the only source of trouble that might disturb the tranquility of the country, was eliminated. And that, inasmuch as the Kurdish chieftan had indicated to the Persian authorities, a strong desire to come to an understanding with the Assyrians, it would absolutely insure the desired end, if his Beatitude could likewise assure Simkoo and his followers of his friendly attitude toward the latter as well.
