'Persians and Shi'ites in Thailand: From the Ayutthaya Period to the Present'

(March 2012, Singapore)

Abstract

This writer delivered a public lecture upon invitation by the renowned Nalanda-Sriwijaya Centre (NSC) at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) in Singapore.
In recent years, Thailand - as well as other Southeast Asian nations such as Malaysia, where to date there are said to live more than 100,000 Iranians in its capital Kuala Lumpur alone - has become a popular destination for Iranians. As a matter of fact, Iranian migration to what is now Thailand began as early as the seventeenth century, during the Ayutthaya period when the kingdom hosted a large colony of Iranian merchants.