Monday, December 31, 2007
Assassination of Benazir Bhutto is an outragous crime against freedom and progress of democracy
United Republicans of IranFor a Democratic and Secular Republic
www.iranrepublic.org
international@jomhouri.com
December 28, 2007
Assassination of Benazir Bhutto is an outragous crime against freedom and progress of democracy
On December 27, Mrs. Benazir Bhutto, leader of Pakistani People’s Party, was a target of assassination and passed away on her way to the hospital. Like his father, Zulfaghar Ali Bhutto, and his two brothers, Mrs. Bhutto was a victim of those who opposed democracy in Pakistan.
United Republicans of Iran considers the horrific terror of Mrs. Bhutto a crime against democracy in Pakistan and the region. This crime shows the deep hatred and danger of the Islamic Fundamentalism, as a force against democracy, progress and modernity.
Although upon her triumphant return to Pakistan she was a target of yet another unsuccessful attempt on her life that led to the death of more than 139 people, the military rulers of Pakistan headed by Gen. Pervez Musharraf did not take any step to bring the culprits to justice but rather began arresting democracy activists instead.
Her heart-rending death also shows that although political pressure by democratic countries and the moral support of freedom lovers toward the process of democratization in one nation is valuable, but it is neither a guarentee for safety of those activists nor success of democracy.
United Republicans of Iran sends its condolences to her party, the people of Pakistan, her family as well as all the freedom lovers of the region.
The grief over her loss is a grief that is shared among all freedom loving people. The most sacred commemoration to her memory is for her people to continue the struggle and to remember her determination on democratic values, to resist against terror and intimidation and to support her nationalistic and progressive principles.
We value her courage and belief in free elections in Pakistan, her resolve for democracy and modernity.
We are certain that the People of Pakistan, inspired by her resistance, courage and sacrifice, will ultimately achieve the freedom and democracy that she most cherished for her people.
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Saturday, December 29, 2007
An Iranian in India, Encouraging Dialogue
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/27/books/27jaha.html?_r=1%268bu=%26oref=slogin%26emc=bu%26pagewanted=printDecember 27, 2007
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
NEW DELHI — “I’ve lived here on and off for two years, with imprisonment in between.” Ramin Jahanbegloo, an Iranian philosopher, described his Indian sojourn this way, and even as he agreed to an interview this month on condition that he not be asked to talk about his home country, which imprisoned him last year, it kept creeping into the conversation, quite uninvited, like a gnome.
In Iran Mr. Jahanbegloo, 50, was accused of collaborating with Americans to destabilize the state, kept in solitary confinement for four months and released on bail.
Out of jail, but with the charges still pending, he returned here to finish his latest book, “India Revisited: Conversations on Contemporary India,” a collection of 27 interviews with 27 remarkable Indians that the Indian arm of Oxford University Press has just published. The book is ostensibly about Indian subjects — dance, caste, Parsis, democracy — but it inexorably engages many of the issues that vex Mr. Jahanbegloo’s homeland, including tradition, pluralism, the West and freedom.
Born in Tehran, Mr. Jahanbegloo discovered India in childhood. His father was an economist, his mother a playwright. The Indian ambassador in Tehran was a guest at family dinner parties when Mr. Jahanbegloo was young, and the library in his home contained the works of Rabindranath Tagore and Jawaharlal Nehru; both had visited Iran.
Mr. Jahanbegloo said that he liked to think of himself as an Indian, without the citizenship, but with what he calls an Indian’s “metaphysical view of the world.” One would be hard-pressed to find a more eloquent promoter of the idea of India.“India is a country where you find a dialogue of cultures in a very deep sense of the term,” Mr. Jahanbegloo said. “I try to understand this spirit. I try to follow this spirit. Even if you find a lot of tension, riots, killings, that spirit itself brings India back.”
Mr. Jahanbegloo’s intellectual home in India, the Center for the Study of Developing Societies, where he has had a faculty appointment for the last two years, is also home to a number of other iconoclasts, like Ashis Nandy, a political psychologist, who likewise appears in the new book. Mr. Nandy explains where Gandhi sits in Indian consciousness. D. L. Sheth, another scholar at the center, discusses the shifting meanings of caste. A filmmaker from Calcutta, Mrinal Sen, occasionally reprimands Mr. Jahanbegloo for not properly understanding his oeuvre.
Kapila Vatsyayan, a cultural historian, offers an elegantly simple explanation of India’s survival. “India has so far demonstrated the capacity to hold together two lifelines, one an original, primal, or indigenous, almost immutable line, and the other of ‘change,’” she tells Mr. Jahanbegloo. “No single unit or dimension is totally ‘insular’ or ‘static.’”
Mr. Jahanbegloo finds this an especially trenchant lesson for Middle Eastern countries, which he says have not been able to accommodate a dialogue of cultures. Instead, he says, they have suffered either a modernization from above, as in the case of Iran under the Shah, or a virulent assertion of fundamentalism from below, as with the Taliban of Afghanistan.
“Iranians, like Arabs, have not been able to digest modernity because they did not find a way to create a permanent dialogue between the two concepts,” he said. “It’s either created authoritarian modernity or authoritarian traditionalism.”
Mr. Jahanbegloo credits Indian thinkers for their “soft reading of modernity, not a violent reaction to it.” Missing from his glowing appraisal is sufficient explanation for the violence that persists in Indian life, whether in the guise of Maoist insurgents or Hindu radicals or home-grown Islamist terrorist groups.
“This is what I think is so important to people of the Middle East, particularly Turks, Iranians and Arabs,” he said. “They want to keep their own identity. They want to be proud of their past. But it’s very important to open up to other cultures. Democracy is a result of this. Democracy is a government of dialogue.”
Mr. Jahanbegloo studied philosophy at the Sorbonne in Paris, and stayed on in France for 20 years. Among his first books were works on the 19th-century German philosophers Arthur Schopenhauer and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. His inquiries were very much European, from the making of the modern European state to the idea of revolution. And he was very much engaged with what he called “philosophies of violence.”
As Mr. Jahanbegloo recalls it now, the violence of the 1979 Iranian revolution kindled his interest in nonviolent ways of making change, though it was not until the early 1990s, when he returned home to Tehran, that his mind returned to the philosophers of nonviolence. In 1998 he wrote a book on Gandhi; in 1999 a book on nonviolence. He invited thinkers from across the world, from Richard Rorty to the writer V. S. Naipaul, to his independent institution, the Cultural Research Bureau, in Tehran. He also published a scholarly journal called Goftegu, or Dialogue.
As it happened, dialogue landed him in prison. In April 2006, while he was on his way to a conference in Belgium, he was arrested at the Tehran airport and sent to the notorious Evin prison; he had recently returned home from Delhi for a vacation. At the time the Iranian information minister was quoted as saying Mr. Jahanbegloo had had “contacts with foreigners.” He was released after confessing that foreign agents might have exploited his expertise. Mr. Jahanbegloo says he told Iranian authorities that he had attended conferences with plenty of foreigners but never with an “antistate agenda” and never to divulge anything to foreign intelligence officials.
“There were no names I could give,” he said in the interview here. “I could give only names of philosophers. There was no way I could reveal any secrets. There were no secrets.”
Other scholars, including two Iranian-Americans, Haleh Esfandiari, the director of the Middle East program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, and Kian Tajbakhsh, an urban planner with ties to the Open Society Institute, were arrested in May on similarly vague accusations of plotting a foreign-sponsored “velvet revolution.”
All three appeared on Iran’s state-run television in July, making statements that could have been interpreted to suggest that they had tried to overthrow the Iranian government. Mr. Jahanbegloo’s televised statement, recorded during his detention in 2006, included the admission that on trips outside Iran he had become acquainted with Americans and Israelis, many of whom, he said on television, were “intelligence figures.”
Ms. Esfandiari and Mr. Tajbakhsh were released in September.
In prison, as a way to get his mind out of his cell, Mr. Jahanbegloo wrote as many as 2,000 aphorisms on the backs of tissue boxes. They will be published soon in Iran in a collection called “A Mind in Winter,” a title that he described as “a metaphor for being alone, hibernating also.”
Next he plans to return to a book he began, but didn’t finish, on Iran and modernity. By early next month Mr. Jahanbegloo, who also holds Canadian citizenship, will move to Toronto with his wife and daughter and join the faculty at the University of Toronto.
David Malone, the Canadian high commissioner here, credits Mr. Jahanbegloo in “India Revisited” for compelling so many Indian scholars “to speak in short, clear, largely jargon-free sentences,” as he wrote in an e-mail message.
“It allows the lay reader to access how thoughtful Indians (and there are so many!) struggle with notions of democracy, multiculturalism, the caste system and the situation of minorities, religious and otherwise, all important issues in India, most of which are mirrored in the West,” he wrote.
For Mr. Jahanbegloo, more than 16 months after his release, the nightmares have begun to dissipate. “Breathing the Indian air brings me health, at least mental health,” he said wryly. “Sometimes I get really mad at the corruption, the Delhi traffic, how people drive, honking all the time. But the absence of nervousness and psychological violence gives you a peaceful life. In many other countries, like America and Iran, people are very nervous, psychologically very nervous.”
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Friday, December 28, 2007
Call for journalist’s release after he has double heart attack in Evin prison
http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=2489528 December 2007
Reporters Without Borders is extremely worried about the health of journalist and human rights activist Emadoldin Baghi, who was rushed to hospital after suffering a double heart attack in Tehran’s Evin prison on 26 December and was returned to a general wing of the prison yesterday evening. He has been held in Evin for the past 74 days.
“The conditions in which Baghi is being held are unacceptable,” the press freedom organisation said. “He has been in solitary confinement ever since he was first taken to Evin, as if imprisonment was not already enough punishment. As his state of health has worsened steadily during the past two months, it is inconceivable that he should be expected to convalesce in prison.”
Baghi was rushed to Tehran’s Khamar Bani Hachem after his double heart attack. His lawyer, Saleh Nikbakht, and his family were finally able to visit him yesterday after spending 24 hours without any news of him. When he was taken back to Evin, he was put in a new cell in section 350 of the prison.
Nikbakht told Reporters Without Borders that the deterioration in Baghi’s health was mainly due to the appalling conditions in the prison and to the harassment to which he has been subjected during interrogation sessions. “Emadoldin Baghi will not survive another heart attack,” he said.
An active campaigner against Iran’s death penalty, Baghi was awarded the French government’s human rights prize in 2005. He was sentenced in 2000 to three years in prison for “violating to national security.”
Meanwhile, Ejlal Ghavami, a reporter for the weekly Payam-e Mardom-e Kurdestan who has been held in the prison of Sanandaj since 9 July, was finally given 10 days leave from the prison on 26 December for treatment to an eye infection that has worsened since his arrest.
Iran’s Supreme Guide, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are both on the Reporters Without Borders list of “press freedom predators.” Twelve journalists are currently detained in Iran.
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Letter from the TUC General Secretarty to Ayatollah Sayed Ali Khamenei of Iran about the imprisoned trade unionist Mahmoud Salehi
21 December 2007His Excellency Ayatollah Sayed Ali Khamenei
The Office of the Supreme Leader
Islamic Republic Street -
Shahid Keshvar Doust Street
Tehran
Islamic Republic of Iran
By email to info@leader.ir
Your Excellency,
Mahmoud Salehi - Release on humanitarian grounds
On behalf of the Trades Union Congress, the national trade union centre for Great Britain, and the 6.5 million British trade union members, I request you to take urgent action to ensure that Mahmoud Salehi's many health problems be properly diagnosed and that he be seen by qualified specialist health professionals and provided with appropriate medical treatment outside prison.
No trade unionist should have to suffer what he, and his family, have suffered, and I call on the Iranian government to stop this inhumane treatment now. He shouldn't be in jail at all, of course, and the TUC, together with trade unionists all over the world, will neither forgive his persecutors nor forget his struggle.
We have been informed by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF) that Mahmoud Salehi, spokesperson for the Organisational Committee to Establish Trade Unions, was admitted to Tohid Hospital in the city of Sanandaj, unconscious, on 11 December, after having collapsed repeatedly in prison between 4 - 10 December. We know that Salehi has long-term medical concerns. We wish to bring to your attention the fact that he suffers from chronic kidney disease, as a result of which he required dialysis. He is also said to suffer from a heart disorder. Most recently, it was reported that he has grave intestinal edema or swelling that may be connected with his renal disease. Following his admission to hospital he received a brain scan. This revealed that blood vessels in his brain have been damaged. We deplore the fact that the authorities took him back to jail in such a critical condition.
Whilst we welcome the recent release of Ebrahim Madadi and Reza Dehgan from prison, we cannot let Salehi's health conditions deteriorate without voicing our grave concerns. This latest development has been the subject of worldwide attention and many organisations are deeply disturbed with the lack of humanitarian treatment by the Iranian authorities.
We once again stress that Mahmoud Salehi must be released immediately on humanitarian grounds or at least be given adequate medical care outside prison urgently. Given the circumstances, Salehi cannot stay in harsh prison facilities for the remaining time of his sentence until next March without serious implications on his health and at great risk to his life. We therefore appeal to you to show mercy and release him on humanitarian grounds, or pardon him.
I am copying this letter to the Foreign Secretary, the Rt Hon David Miliband MP.
Yours sincerely
BRENDAN BARBER
General Secretary
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The Story of That Bloodied Shirt
http://www.roozonline.com/english/archives/2007/12/the_story_of_that_bloodied_shi.htmlNooshabeh Amiri
Ahmad Batebi is an Iranian student who became famous around the world for his appearance on the cover of The Economist, holding up a bloodied shirt belonging to a fellow student who was injured during the 1999 student uprising in Tehran. I entertained the idea of interviewing Batebi after visiting a link, which I share with you below:
http://www.4shared.com/file/32237602/35d66a43/vaghti_ke_negaham.html
At 11:30 p.m., Paris Time – 2 a.m. Tehran time – I spoke with Ahmad Batebi. He did not have any preconditions for the interview; but I had a precondition with myself: not to ask him about prison and torture. “Those 9 years have ended,” he says, “but I have at least 4 more 9-years to live.”
Rooz (R): Where were you on 18 Tir, 1378 [July 8, 1999]?
Ahmad Batebi (AB): Home. At that time, I was a film student. I was preparing my final project, which was on drug addiction and social epidemics in Iran. There was a drug addict around the campus who was supposed to help me with the research for my project. The day before, he had introduced me to some of his friends, who were also addicts. Basically, I was preparing myself to shoot some footage, until those incidents took place on 18 Tir.
(R): Which you had not anticipated…
(AB): I wasn’t supposed to anticipate them. 18 Tir happened; it was not planned.
(R): I saw you that day and your picture is stuck in my mind, but I didn’t think that that picture would be viewed all over the world. When you held that shirt up, did you think that this would happen?
(AB): No, I had no idea. But there was a build up to that incident which many don’t know about. That’s why I want to tell you something now that I couldn’t tell in the beginning. Prior to 18 Tir, I was arrested 3 times for participating in student protests. My first arrest was because of my participation in a protest in support of political prisoners on 15 Esfand, 1377 [March 6, 1998]. I was arrested for a second time during a student demonstration on 15 Ordibehesht, 1378 [May 3, 1999]. The third time I was arrested on 4 Khordad, 1378 [May 25, 1999] and released on 10 Tir, 1378 [July 1, 1999]. Until 18 Tir [July 8]. Therefore, one of the reasons that that incident happened for me like that, and that their confrontation was severe, was this build up. They knew me and were ready to confront me. Logically too, a person should not be treated so harshly by the police and the judiciary for one picture. My relationship with Daftar-e Tahkim-e Vahdat [Office for Consolidating Student Unity], the late Forouhars, and the office of Iran Farda also added to things.
(R): What happened to you in prison? Does your description of Ahmad Batebi now differ from your description of Ahmad Batebi before prison?
(AB): Gradually, I became two persons, with two identities; two different identities. One identity belonged to a person who made movies, practiced music, listened to music, enjoyed art, had artist friends, wrote… and then suddenly something out of his control happened. Let me confess to something here. If at that time I knew that something like this was going to happen to me, maybe I wouldn’t have done it, then. But if the same thing happens now, I will do it again.
(R): You mean after going through prison.
(AB): Yes; I will again do what I did, but maybe I wouldn’t have done it then. Well, the incident happened and a new ability arouse in me – perhaps it existed before too but I didn’t know – and another personality sprung in me. Another identity. With the situation that I had in prison, it wasn’t possible for me to be the same Ahmad Batebi. I became this Ahmad Batebi and then tried to stick to what I expect of myself. I formed two personalities alongside one another.
(R): Would you have preferred to stay the same Ahmad Batebi?
(AB): No, I prefer to be what I am now. It’s true that I couldn’t continue my studies, but I learned to make movies; I learned to write; I learned to write songs. Back then too I wrote what I write now. In us, there was always protest. There is protest now too. I didn’t allow that incident to affect my entire being. It was an experience that is now over. I didn’t let the experience of prison, which is ongoing, to darken my entire life. It was a part of my life that happened and is now over. I closed that file.
(R): Can you close that file? And forget about it?
(AB): I won’t forget about it. I gave up a lot for it, both physically and in terms of my family. But I won’t allow it to undermine my life. I endured 9 years of prison, but I have least 4 more 9-years to live. In addition, I like experiencing things. My identity forms with new experiences. I will continue to experience new things, both good and bad. Despite its hardshisp, this experience made me realize things that I would have perhaps not realized for another 20 years.
(R): How old are you now?
(AB): 29 years.
(R): Only 29 years?
(AB): Yes, though I spent a third of it with the gentlemen.
(R): Are you planning on leaving Iran?
(AB): No; I prefer to stay here. I have a lot of things to do, I can’t just get up and leave. I like to study, and I like to see the world and experience new things. But I have to take care of some business here first. Also, I predict a good future. I see a bright future. That’s why I won’t leave Iran.
(R): Have you compared your latest photographs with that famous picture?
(AB): Yes, I have. My face has more wrinkles now. I have more gray hair. I have physical ailments, problems with my back, kidney, head. But these things would have happened even if I were outside.
(R): At 29 years of age?
(AB): Well, you can’t do anything about it. It was something that happened. Even God couldn’t have done anything about it; he would’ve if he could.
(R): Do you visit Rooz Online?
(AB): Yes; I visit it every day. It is a prominent website with good analyses. It is like a newspaper that is published in Tehran.
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Thursday, December 27, 2007
"Family Protection" Act and the Future of our Daughters
By: Jelve JavaheriTranslated by: SZ
The first measure taken towards changing family laws within the framework of Iran’s civil laws was Dr. Maehangiz Manouchehrain’s proposed draft of the family law. This document was first published as an addendum to a book titled "Legal Status of Women in the World", a book published by the Iranian Women Lawyers’ Association in February 1963. This proposed draft was published again in 1964 as a standalone pamphlet named "Proposed Draft of Family Law Based on the Equality of Women and Men." It was then published in the weekly women’s magazine "Etellaat-e-Banouvan" in four consecutive issues. However, at that time, because of the reactions of the religious leaders stating that the proposed draft was against Islamic jurisprudence and because the then Justice Minister (Dr.Ameli) opposed the idea, Manouchehrian was unsuccessful in gaining the support of at least 15 parliamentarians to take the bill to the Senate floor. The Justice Minister at the time announced that the civil laws of Iran would not change. He called Manouchehrian’s proposed draft of the family law "a product of her own conclusions of her research" and stated: "in the Judiciary, no proposed law which is deemed to be incompatible with the enlightened religion of Islam would receive any consideration." Manouchehrian, because of her answer to the Justice Minister’s comments, was banished to Tafrash for three months.
After Manouchehrian’s proposed bill, which was vetoed because of the position that the Justice Minister had taken, the discussions of the family laws came to a standstill. This went on until towards the end of 1965 when the issues concerning women’s rights once again received some attention, especially in women’s publications. Manouchehrian, despite all the problems and difficulties that had arisen, started laying the groundwork for bringing up the proposed bill for discussion in the Senate. On October 24, 1996, in her speech before the call to order in the Senate, Manouchehrian presented the proposed family protection bill. After the introduction of the family protection bill in the Senate, some publications started printing news about the proposed law. One of these publications was "Payghame Emrouz", which published the news about the introduction of the bill in the Senate and printed articles about the elimination of polygamy and temporary marriage (sigheh). But unfortunately, many publications, including women’s magazines chose to remain silent and some publications called the proposed bill premature and radical.
Manouchehrian’s proposed bill, even though it opened a new door to discussions of family protection measures and women’s rights in the press and in the society, did not ultimately get anywhere and as Sharif Emami said, it wasn’t examined according to appropriate standards. But all of a sudden, in February 1967, with much propaganda, a bill named "Family Law" appeared in government publications. In the presentation of the bill, there was no mention of Mehangiz Manouchehrian’s name whatsoever nor was there any acknowledgement of her efforts in starting the discussion of family laws. On the contrary, Manouchehrian’s proposed bill was labeled as hasty and immoderate. Women’s weekly magazine "Zane Rouz" reported of the passage of the bill in Majlis (the lower house of the parliament in Iran at the time) on May 27, 1967 and published a detailed explanation of the articles of that law. At last, after being passed by the Majlis, the bill was sent to the Senate for final approval. Finally, on June 17, 1967, "Zane Rouz" reported the final ratification of the bill in the Senate, after which it was signed into law.
At that time, even though the Family Protection Act had been signed into law and was enforceable, many of the old laws were still being upheld unless they were in stark contrast to the new law. In such instances, the court had to act on the basis of the Family Protection Act. Although this law had a lot of positive aspects which, compared to the previous conditions, were in favor of women, it had its shortcomings, too. This is to say that in comparison to Manouchehrian’s proposed bill, it appeared conservative. The Family Protection Act only modified the previous laws whereas Manouchehrian’s bill aimed at more profound changes. As an example, in Manouchehrian’s proposed bill polygamy was to be abolished altogether, whereas in the bill that was signed into law, polygamy remained unchanged. Even so, after the ratification of the bill, "Zane Rouz" reported that the gaining of new rights by women, however little those rights were, had caused men to react and raise the issue of dowry (mahrieh). Some men had written to the editor stating that in the light of the Family Protection Act and granting the right to divorce to women, dowry (mahrieh) was an old-fashioned tradition and a thing of the past that was no longer relevant.
Mehrangiz Manouchehrian, in critique of this law and the issues it had failed to address wrote a book titled "Inequalities of the Rights of Women and Men in Iran and the Methods to Correct them" which was published by the Iranian Women Lawyers’ Association. In this book, she addressed issues such as housing, divorce, permission to travel abroad, citizenship, custody, guardianship, trusteeship, inheritance, blood money (diah), employment, polygamy, temporary marriage and other cases of inequality in the laws, none of which had been corrected even by the revised Family Protection Act of 1974. She therefore proposed new laws correcting these inequalities. Not long had passed since the publication of Manouchehrian’s book and her critique of the Family Protection Act and the civil laws that with the advent of the Revolution in 1979, the Family Protection Act was abolished altogether. As it turned out, the minimum rights that women, in spite of the contempt of the powers that be, had gradually gained over the years, did not last very long.
Three decades have passed since then. Throughout these years, some of the laws have changed in minor ways, but no serious attention has been given to the damage done to women all these years by discriminatory laws. Children continue to be the victims of the contemptuous way in which their mothers are treated. If women had defended the bill unanimously to get equal rights when the Family Protection Bill based on equality was introduced in the Majlis and if women of every political orientation, belief or religion had unequivocally fought for upholding that law, after 30 years, we would not be witness to so much injustice brought upon innocent girls. The lives and childhood d reams of these very young girls are sent to the slaughterhouse at the will of their fathers. Now, after three decades another bill bearing the name of Family Protection is being sent to the Majlis. This bill not only fails to abolish or limit polygamy, it even removes the few obstacles (wife’s permission) that stood in its way. Our present situation is like 30 years ago when the Family Protection Law was abolished, or 40 years ago when despite a strong proposed bill, a weak law was passed by the parliament. Now is the time to become aware of what we are doing to our children. Alas, how we are burning the dreams of tomorrow’s women in the fires of our ignorant ways today!
The bill that some are trying again to pass in the Majlis now is a bill which will cost us the lives of today’s women and the women of many generations to come in our beloved country. It will cost us the destructed futures of the children who are burning in the fire of the polygamy of their fathers, and who, because of their shame and ignominy cannot hold up their heads fearing that they may make eye contact with others with their frightened and innocent eyes. These are the children whose lives may turn to ashes at the spark of a fire fueled by their fathers’ greed and lust, and thanks to the polygamy laws, their future hangs on a thin thread of jealousy and grudge.
What do we want now? Do we want to bring about the destruction of the lives of women and children by resorting to political and sectarian differences and positioning the bill in a polarized and adversarial environment? What we are bargaining for is not a simple matter. It is the life and fate of a woman, who after 30 years since her husband’s death, when she remembers how her husband married another woman and how he lashed her frail body with a belt, still sheds tears as wide as her face. The fate of the bill is the fate of a defenseless child who is killed by her father’s other wife, and her chopped up body is found among layers of sheets, mattresses and quilts. The discussion of the bill is the discussion of the life of a girl who, after her husband marries another woman, pours boiling water on herself and burns herself to death, even though forced marriage and not having the right to divorce had already burned her soul and spirit to death. Suffering, compromising and putting up with it all, that’s what women are expected to do under a law that is disguised under the cloak of a family protection law but says: "The only right you have is to remain silent."
Yes, this bill is the fate of thousands of women who are burning in front of stoves, but they tolerate and toil, and from the bottom of their hearts they imprecate. In contrast, their men, arrogant and exultant, every day find other women who are also burning in front of other stoves, and by the mere utterance of the words that legitimize an Islamic marriage, the lives of these women are set on fire in an instant.
Now let’s take another look at the thousands of cases that are open in Family Courts. Let’s take a responsible and careful look at these cases so that we can see that family laws have even tied the hands of lawyers, judges, social workers, etc. They cannot base their judgment on a law that is clear and enforceable, issue a verdict that is fair, present a defense befitting a human being, or even open a small window to a flicker of hope. They cannot shine a flicker of the light of hope to the pleading eyes of women who no longer even have the strength to climb the stairs of the court. Let’s demand justice for women to whom we will be accountable some day in the future.
Let’s stand together, whatever our ideology or political orientation may be. Whether we are a member of parliament, a member of the Women’s Commission of the Judiciary, a women’s rights activist, or even a mere passer-by, we must stand together because we know how the ratification of the bill can challenge the lives and safety of thousands of families in our country. Let’s all give each other a hand in an endeavor to correct this bill and other family-related laws in a rational and calm atmosphere, and in doing so, bring the gift of a just law to our lives and the lives of millions of other women.
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Jailed Iranian rights activist hospitalised: report
Thu Dec 27, 6:32 AM ETIranian human rights activist and anti-death penalty campaigner Emaddedin Baghi, held in jail for more than two months, has been hospitalised after suffering a nervous attack, his lawyer said Thursday.
"He has been receiving medical care since Wednesday afternoon when he was taken to a Tehran private hospital," lawyer Saleh Nikbakht told AFP.
"He collapsed twice in his cell in Wednesday morning... his doctor told me the attacks were caused by high nervous pressure," he said, adding that Baghi's condition was now normal.
Baghi has been in Tehran's notorious Evin prison since his arrest on October 12, when he was ordered to serve an outstanding one-year jail term for creating propaganda against the system.
Nikbakht said that according to his latest information, Baghi was still in hospital and had been allowed to meet his family there. He added his client was satisfied with speed of the reaction by the Evin authorities to his collapse.
"Baghi's general state was not good and he was transferred to one of Tehran's hospitals," the director general of Tehran province prisons, Sohrab Soleimani, was quoted as saying by the ISNA news agency late on Wednesday.
Baghi, who heads the Committee for the Defence of Prisoners' Rights, has already served several jail terms in Iran while also receiving awards from Western countries for his work.
According to the charges, Baghi obtained secret information from prisoners and then disseminated this information during seminars organised by his group.
He has publicly protested against the wave of hangings, many in public, that have swept Iran in recent months as part of a campaign the authorities say is aimed at improving security in society.
In September Baghi wrote an open letter to the heads of reformist parties -- including former president Mohammad Khatami and ex-parliament speaker Mehdi Karroubi -- complaining of their silence over the increase in hangings.
In 2005 he was awarded a top human rights prize by France for his work campaigning against the death penalty. New-York based Human Rights Watch (HRW) and the US State Department have both called for his release.
Capital offences in Iran include murder, rape, armed robbery, serious drug trafficking and adultery. The Islamic republic is currently believed to be the second most prolific applier of the death penalty worldwide after China.
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Wednesday, December 26, 2007
A Third Approach: On the Interaction between Secular Forces and Islamic Reformists in Iran
Source: http://www.gozaar.org/http://www.gozaar.org/template1.php?id=935
By: Mehrdad Mashayekhi
In a culture in which going to extremes is the most common way of dealing with new phenomena, approaches to problems are deeply polarized. In this type of culture, aggressive confrontation is chosen over moderation, unprejudiced attitudes, reason, critical thinking, and the pursuit of long-term benefits. This conflict and polarization permeate the political culture and dualistic labels such as liberator/traitor, progressive/conservative, pro/anti-people, and natural ally/enemy are commonly used. Similarly, when the issue of Iran’s “state reformism” is raised; these categories also rise to the surface of the political and ideological discourse.
During the last decade, secular political intellectuals and activists have reacted to the 2nd of Khordad Movement in diverse ways. Some were non-critical followers while others categorically rejected the movement, saying it was no better than the hardliner approach. As the elections for the Eighth Parliament loom large, it is crucial to re-define the position of Islamic reformists in the political landscape and to address them thoughtfully. This is particularly important for the segment of Iran’s political society (both inside and outside its borders) that supports a secular, democratic, and republican framework.
Polarized attitudes towards the reformists exist for several reasons. First, the weakness of reformist currents in Iran’s past political experience and culture has led to a mistrust of reformers. Even though some reform efforts have existed since the 19thcentury, the defeat of those few efforts and the persistence of dictatorship have yielded pessimism among the public and society’s thinkers about the concept of reform. It has also led to the demise of a culture in which such social and political attitudes can evolve. Therefore, during the 20th century, except for a few isolated cases, the political intellectualism of Iranians manifested itself in revolutionary ideas – an approach undoubtedly inspired by Marxism-Leninism.
Second, Iran’s reform movement is distinct from most other examples in the non-Islamic world in that the reformist wing of government separates itself clearly from the regime’s democratic opposition. The famous division of “insiders” versus “outsiders” was created by the Organization of the Mojahedin of the Islamic Republic, an important group within the reformist coalition. Consequently, the reformists’ pro-Islamic ideology is a barrier to cooperation– created by the reformists themselves, not by the secular, democratic opposition. In most countries with authoritarian governments, reformists inside and outside government have some degree of complicity in their vision of a future democratic government. In Iran, however, reformists seek a democratic Islamic republic, while the regime’s democratic opposition seeks a secular parliamentary republic (or constitutional monarchy).
Third, Islamic reformists have remained uncritical of, and have even justified, the failure of the eight-year reform project (1997-2005). The ineffectiveness of the 2nd of Khordad Movement resulted, in large part, from a lack of planning, elitism, internal squabbles, lack of leadership, conservative goals, a disconnect with civil society, as well as other factors. These factors were discussed in another article entitled: “The Impasse of the Islamic Reformists: Caught between the Regime and the Movement.” (1) Today, two and a half years after the reformists’ official ouster from government and Parliament, we still have not seen a formal, organized self-critique to analyze this failure and the fundamental shortcomings of the movement. Attempts were made to pin these failures onto the authoritarian policies of the government and nothing else.
A few reformists, individually, pointed to some deficiencies. But neither those individuals nor the main reformist organizations such as the Islamic Participation Front or the Organization of the Mojahedin of the Islamic Republic uses those deficiencies as a tool to guide them forward.
Saeed Hajarian, a prominent reformist theorist, writes: “Reform is dead, long live reform.” He insists on keeping the constitutional Islamic model and making the Islamic government more effective. The Organization of the Mojahedin of the Islamic Republic also talk about harnessing the unused capacities of the Constitution to impose some limitations on the existing regime: “Being present in elected organizations, including councils, Parliament, the presidency and the Assembly of Experts and attempting to limit the authority of leaders and hold them accountable are the most important goals of every reform-minded political group.” (2)
As Islamist theorist Abbas Abdi says: “The approach of the reformists in government was useless, even damaging. Continuing along their path was against all logic. Their policy of ‘wait and anticipate,’ was like spooning yogurt into the sea to make a yogurt drink [fruitless and idealistic]. Consequently, they should have either taken another approach, or if that was not something they wanted or were able to do, they should have at least stopped doing harm.” (3)
The three points explained above will naturally repel potential supporters for cooperation and widen the gap between secular democrats and Islamic reformists. In the last two and a half years following the defeat of the reformists in the presidential elections, they have fallen back into their so-called “return to Islamic roots” policy and avoided any cooperation and interaction with secular forces in Iran, even compared to the recent past. This attitude only adds to the pessimism of secular forces and to their increased opposition to reformists.
Fourth, in the meantime, a few non-religious expatriate reformists are offering unconditional support to Islamic reformists. In other writings, I have referred to them as “conservative republicans.” Their logic is that, in the present chaos, where hardliners control all aspects of government, there is no choice left for those in favor of reform but to support the reformist candidates in the Islamic Republic’s elections. Only a reformist victory will bring about a political opening and an opportunity for the democratic secular forces to reach out and connect with their grassroots.
Therefore, there are two contrasting tendencies towards Islamic reformists among Iran’s democratic secular opposition: one is to follow them in an unconditional way and the other is to regard them essentially similar to hardliners in government. The purpose of this article is to find some common ground between these two extreme approaches in order to establish a logical relationship with the Islamic reformists. Naturally, in order to make the best of the existing election process, sound policies will have to follow.
***
Obviously, the hardliners in government and, to a lesser degree, the reformists represent certain social forces. In my opinion, at least 60 percent of Iran’s society is not represented by either group, and, potentially, can be mobilized by secular forces. At this time, however, no group has the capacity or hope of filling this void. But even in these chaotic circumstances, secular intellectuals and political forces must keep in mind the historical interests of seculars in Iran.
Considering Iran’s current complex environment, my overall perception of the religious reform movement is fairly positive due to its potential to deliver cultural and political diversity and a softer Shi’a discourse. From this perspective, a democratic regime in Iran can only emerge from a fundamental compromise between democratic religious groups and democratic secular forces despite their internal diversity. Religious democrats should not assume that adopting such a positive position would automatically result in deferential, non-independent, or non-critical reactions at every juncture. The essence of this approach, which must be communicated through constructive dialogue, is to make the reformists realize that eventually they must come to terms with Iran’s secular society as an important social phenomenon which can tip the scales in the future elections. Reformists sometimes overlook the social importance of secularism by underestimating the political power of this segment of the society. At the same time, they occasionally blame the forces which advocated for boycotting the latest presidential election for their defeat. But aren’t most of those who withheld their votes in fact disillusioned secular people who would have willingly participated in the election under the right circumstances (and may still)?
The reformists must also make clear their position on the issue of electoral freedoms and refrain from double talking in this area. For Iran’s secular groups that are barred from being elected, the idea of free elections (literally) is a positive strategic policy. Meanwhile, for reformists, who have some advantages even under the present regime, a free election has much more limited benefit. Let us look at some contradictory statements from the recent congress of Organization of the Mojahedin of the Islamic Republic: “Reformists must participate in the elections as long as there is some acceptable degree of freedom of participation. Even though they are struggling for their ultimate goal to bring about legal, free, and fair elections as the most basic condition to realize the government of people, they should continue to participate in elections with reasonable competitive freedom, even if these elections are not completely fair. […] Choosing to participate in only an ‘ideal’ election makes the opportunity to participate very unlikely. Of course, if an election lacks the minimum requirements for competitive participation, boycotting or not participating would be unavoidable.”
This should raise some important questions to the Islamic reformists: For example, do the majority of Iran’s elections, like the Ninth presidential elections in 2005 and the elections to the Seventh Parliament, enjoyed a reasonable level of participation? Also when reformists who enjoy many privileges and possibilities (compared to secular forces) are asked to rethink participating in an election that barely meets minimum standards, how can secular forces, which do not even have the right to present a candidate, be expected to participate and vote for the reformists?
***
To conclude:
For the modern, democratic, and secular forces of Iran’s society (who mostly belong to the urban middle class), finding suitable approaches to self-organization, promoting collective awareness, and being sensitive to their constituency (within a religious political regime) are the top priorities. Those political organizations and groups that are supportive and cooperative towards this segment of society must play a constructive role in this endeavor and must stay committed to it. Currently, these forces have a policy of non-participation in today’s non-free elections. This does not preclude their participation under exceptional circumstances or specific criteria. Also, this does not prevent them from participating in the process of an electoral campaign during which they can publicly discuss their demands and requests.
For Iran’s democratic secular forces, the struggle for “free” elections, with all its pre-conditions such as freedom of speech, assembly, party formation, and elimination of government censorship bodies, is a strategic goal. However, in a non-free election, we must distinguish between the short-term temptation to vote for a “lesser evil” and a long-term strategy to carve out a political space for secular forces. While it remains true that if reformists hold high positions in government, the environment and conditions for the democratic secular forces will improve. But this sound logic should not create a vicious circle; the secular forces are forced to select their candidates only between the reformists and hardliners. This begs the question, what incentive will remain for the reformists to elevate the elections from the current level (in which they have a strategic advantage) to the level of a free election?
Perhaps one way to address this exceptional problem is the formation of a “pact” between secular forces (if they are able to organize themselves at minimum level) and the Islamic reformists. In this pact, the reformists would commit to publicize and implement certain demands of the secular forces, and the seculars would, in turn, lend their support to the reformist candidates. The advantage of this plan for seculars is that they can have a limited impact, on their own terms, rather than being unconditionally supportive, while continuing to pursue the long-term goal of free elections. Consequently, if the religious progressive religious reformists want a free and democratic Iran, as they claim they do, and recognize that secular forces have a place there, they must adopt a strategy of incorporating the seculars’ demands into their election policies.
In Iran, under the leadership of the Supreme Leader, there has been and will be major contradictions, such as the likes of Ahmadinejad. This should not be used as an excuse to disregard our fundamental democratic duty to recognize the rights of the “excluded laic” (4) Iranians.
Footnote:
1. This article was first published by Mehrdad Mashayekhi under the title: “The Impasse of the Islamic Reformists: Caught between the Regime and the Movement” Ayin Journal, Issue 3, Tehran, May 2006.
2. From the final resolution of the eleventh annual meeting of the Organization of the Mojahedin of the Islamic Republic, October 23, 2007.
3. Abbas Abdi, Commentary on a Dual Governing Strategy.
4. A term used by Islamic reformist sociologist Hamid Reza Jalaipour.
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Sunday, December 23, 2007
Iran: ITUC Welcomes Release of Unionists Madadi and Reza Dehgan and Calls for Release of others
Brussels, 17 December 2007: The ITUC has welcomed the release on 16 December of Ebrahim Madadi, Vice President of the Syndicate of Workers of Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company (Syndica Sherkate-Vahed) and Reza Dehghan, Union of the Painters (Sandicika Nagash) detained. Madadi had been detained since 9 August, without any legitimate reason, Reza Dehgan since 18th November.The ITUC nevertheless remains very concerned at the at the treatment of Mahmoud Salehi, the former President of the Saqez Bakers’ Union, who is being kept in harsh prison conditions in Sanandaj despite his very poor health and fears that his life might be at severe risk.
The ITUC also condemns the continuing repression of trade unionists, including the recent arrests of Ebrahim Gohari, a member of the Executive Board of the Vahed union, Mohsen Hakimi, a member of the Coordinating Committee to Form Workers’ Organisations, and two independent labour activists, Alireza Asghari and Hossein Gholami, in Tehran on 14 December.
“We call on the Government of Iran to free all detained trade unionists and drop all charges against them. In particular, the President of the Vahed union, Mansour Ossanloo, must be released immediately and unconditionally”, said ITUC General Secretary Guy Ryder.
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Friday, December 21, 2007
24 Internet cafés closed and 23 arrests as government steps up online
Reporters Without Borders condemns the closure of 24 Internet cafés in thecourse of a police operation in Tehran on 16 December in which 23 people,including 11 women, were arrested for “immoral behaviour.”“This is further evidence of an even more radical government line on freeexpression, especially when women are involved,” the press freedomorganisation said. “The grounds for arresting these women were extremelyvague. They did nothing to threaten public morality. We firmly condemn thisattack on freedoms, and we call for the release of all 23 detainees and thereopening of the Internet cafés.”
The Tehran police said a total of 170 cafés and Internet cafés were warnedon 15 December that they were risking the possibility of closure.
The raids coincide with a reinforcement of the official campaign launchedin April against women violating the Islamic dress code. They are beingadvised not to wear “western-style” dress such as tight trousers or highboots, regarded as “inappropriate attire.” Since Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became president in 2005, everyone’s physical appearance is supposed to respectIslam.
Cyber-feminists Maryam Hosseinkhah and Jelveh Javaheri are meanwhile stillbeing held in Evin prison in the northern outskirts of Tehran. Hosseinkhah,32, a journalist who writes for the websites Zanestan and WeChange, hasbeen held since 18 November. Javaheri, 30, was arrested on 1 December.
After charging them with publishing false information, disturbing publicopinion and “publicity against the Islamic Republic,” the authorities havedemanded very large amounts of bail (95,000 euros for Hosseinkhah and50,000 euros for Javaheri) to release them.
Iran is one of the strictest countries in the world as regards onlinefiltering and censorship. For the past year, all websites that offer newsabout Iran have been required to register with the culture ministry.According to the council of ministers, insulting Islam or othermonotheistic religions, spreading separatist ideologies, publishing falsenews or publishing news that invades privacy are all grounds for declaringa website illegal.
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Iran: Terrorist Freed In Germany Is Welcomed By Tehran
There once was a well-known restaurant in central Berlin called Mykonos. Its Greek fare was said to be good, but it is now remembered for an altogether different reason: on the site of the former restaurant is a plaque -- to which Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad personally objected -- that lists three Iranian-Kurdish leaders who were "murdered [here in 1992] by the then-rulers of Iran. They died fighting for freedom and human rights."The infamous "Mykonos Operation," which shone an unprecedented light on the Islamic republic's campaign to assassinate critics in the Iranian-exile community and sparked a diplomatic crisis between Europe and Iran, is back in the headlines. Some 15 years after Iranian agents killed three top members of the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI) and one of their supporters in a Berlin restaurant, Germany on December 10 released and deported two of the crime's masterminds.
One of them, Kazem Darabi, was greeted by senior Foreign Ministry officials upon his return home. Leading the welcome at Tehran's airport was Ali Baqeri, the acting head of the Foreign Ministry's Europe section, in what some say amounted to an Iranian admission of complicity in a crime for which the regime has long denied responsibility.
Baqeri himself denied any such conclusion. But Shohreh Badei, the widow of one of the Mykonos victims, begged to differ.
Speaking to RFE/RL's Radio Farda, she criticized Germany for releasing Darabi and his Lebanese accomplice, Abbas Rhayel, in what German media are now speculating might be part of a planned prisoner swap between Israel and Lebanon's Hizballah militia, which is backed by Iran. Rhayel, reportedly a Hizballah agent, was one of the convicted Mykonos gunmen and was deported this week to Lebanon."
It was just a deal for the sake of political and economic gains," Badei says. "Two terrorists, who have been so very loyal to the Iranian regime and their policies, have been released so easily, 10 years ahead of time. It has angered all Iranians."
Mehdi Ebrahimzadeh was sitting at the same table in the Mykonos restaurant with the four men who were killed that day in September 1992. He realizes he is lucky to be alive.
"I saw a very tall person -- taller than average -- about 180-185 centimeters, whose face was covered up to his eyes," he says. "Only his forehead was visible. He shouted some insulting words, probably to get our attention. Then I noticed some rays of light coming out of a handkerchief or cloth. Later I realized that the rays actually were bullets coming from his gun, which was wrapped in a sack."
Ebrahimzadeh said he also disagrees with the decision by the German government to release the two men. "Personally...I don't support vengeance," he says. But "justice should be done, and justice should be restored in a democratic way."
Iran's Assassination Program Exposed
After a trial that lasted 3 and 1/2 years, a German court in 1997 concluded the Iranian government was "directly involved" in the killings. Chief Federal Prosecutor Kay Nehm issued an arrest warrant for Iran's intelligence minister at the time, Ali Fallahian, and said Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and then-President Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani had knowledge of the crime. Other warrants were issued for two Tehran-based agents of the same ministry.
In reaction to the case, EU governments withdrew their ambassadors from Tehran and dropped their "constructive engagement" policy with the Islamic regime.
Darabi was identified as an agent of the ministry based in Germany. He recruited four Lebanese nationals, including Rhayel, to assist in the operation, whose primary target was PDKI leader Sadegh Sharafkandi, who had taken over the Iranian-Kurdish party after the killing in Austria of the previous PDKI head, Abdol-Rahman Ghassemlou.
According to court papers, the killers' final preparations took place in the Berlin home of Darabi, who had "organized these killings for the Iranian secret intelligence. He was aware of the aim and had intentionally taken part in the murder of those four people."
This plaque commemorating the victims now stands at the site (AFP)To be sure, Iranian officials have been implicated in several other overseas terrorist acts, including the 1994 bombing of a Buenos Aires Jewish center that killed 85 people; the 1990 assassination of Kazem Rajavi, a professor, in Switzerland; and Ghassemlou's killing in Vienna. But the Mykonos case is widely seen as being the most significant, according to the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center, an organization based in the United States.
That's because the trial brought out operational details about Iran's program to silence its exiled critics through a brutal program of overseas assassinations. The trial also included unprecedented testimony from a former high-ranking Iranian intelligence officer with direct experience in such operations. And the public release by German authorities of important intelligence exposed Iran's program of assassinations in Western Europe.
For Darabi, though, all of that means little now.
In comments carried by the state-run IRNA news agency, Darabi said the decision to free him "proves I am innocent." He denied any links to Iranian intelligence or any other organization: "I was only a member of the association of Muslim students in Europe. It was for this reason that I was arrested."
He added that he intends to write a book in German. "I have spoken with a number of German authors who are going to come to Iran in the next months, and I will write about this scandal from the beginning to the end," he said. "And with evidence, facts, and logic, I will prove to everyone that I was arrested without any evidence and that I am innocent."
Nearly 10 years ago, a German court reached a different verdict. It's still there to see at the former site of the Mykonos restaurant in Berlin's Wilmersdorf's district: "They died fighting for freedom and human rights."
(RFE/RL's Radio Farda contributed to this report.)
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Thursday, December 20, 2007
Iran: Woman's execution postponed
12/20/07Iran: Woman's execution postponed
Amnesty International Public Statement
The execution of Raheleh Zamani has reportedly been postponed until around 2 January 2008. She had been due to be hanged in Evin Prison, in the capital, Tehran, on 19 December 2007 (not 20 December as previously stated) for the killing of her husband.
Raheleh Zamani, a mother of two children aged five and three, was sentenced to qesas-e nafs (retribution in kind) in October 2005 for the murder earlier the same year of her husband, Mohammad, whom she alleged was having an extra-marital affair. Raheleh Zamani reportedly said in her defence that she was threatened with violence by her husband each time she asked him to end his affair. She said that she had never meant to kill her husband, but just wanted to "teach him a lesson". A month and a half prior to the murder, Raheleh Zamani had given birth to her second child, a son. She may have been suffering from severe post-natal depression. Her husband's family had refused to accept diyeh (blood money). However, it is believed that the postponement of Raheleh Zamani's execution follows a decision by her husband's family to give her two weeks in which to raise the money for the payment of diyeh. The amount of money in question is not known to Amnesty International.
Raheleh Zamani is believed to be held in Evin Prison in the capital, Tehran. On 19 December, one woman and three men were hanged at the prison. This brings to six the total number of women believed to have been executed in Iran in 2007. In addition to Raheleh Zamani, two other men were also spared execution in order to give them the chance to raise diyeh.
Executions in Iran have increased sharply in 2007, particularly in the wake of a crackdown on "social vices" which was announced in April and has continued to date. Amnesty International has recorded at least 310 executions to date, some of which have been in public, including some multiple hangings.
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Please send appeals to arrive as quickly as possible, in Persian, English, Arabic or your own language:
- seeking clarification of reports that the execution of Raheleh Zamani has been postponed until around 2 January 2008, to allow her to raise the money needed for the payment of diyeh;
- calling for Raheleh Zamani's death sentence to be commuted;
- stating that you recognize that governments have a right and a duty to bring to justice those suspected of criminal offences, but stating your unconditional opposition to the death penalty, as the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment and violation of the right to life;
- asking for details of her trial and any appeals, including how the judge determined that she had committed pre-meditated murder;
- urging the Iranian authorities to bring Iranian legislation into line with their international human rights obligations, so that people sentenced to death for murder have the right to seek pardon or commutation of their sentence from the state.
APPEALS TO:
Head of the Judiciary
Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi
Howzeh Riyasat-e Qoveh Qazaiyeh / Office of the Head of the Judiciary
Pasteur St., Vali Asr Ave., south of Serah-e Jomhouri, Tehran 1316814737, Islamic Republic of Iran
Email: info@dadgostary-tehran.ir (In the subject line write: FAO Ayatollah Shahroudi)
Salutation: Your Excellency
COPIES TO:
Leader of the Islamic Republic
His Excellency Ayatollah Sayed 'Ali Khamenei
The Office of the Supreme Leader, Islamic Republic Street - Shahid Keshvar Doust Street
Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran
Email: info@leader.ir
Salutation: Your Excellency
President
His Excellency Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
The Presidency, Palestine Avenue, Azerbaijan Intersection, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran
Email: dr-ahmadinejad@president.ir
via website: www.president.ir/email
Director, Human Rights Headquarters of Iran
His Excellency Mohammad Javad Larijani
Howzeh Riassat-e Ghoveh Ghazaiyeh
(Office of the Head of the Judiciary)
Pasteur St.,
Vali Asr Ave., south of Serah-e Jomhuri,
Tehran 1316814737
Fax: +98 21 3390 4986 (please keep trying)
Email: fsharafi@bia-judiciary.ir (In the subject line: FAO Mohammad Javad Larijani)
int_aff@judiciary.ir (In the subject line: FAO Mohammad Javad Larijani)
and to diplomatic representatives of Iran accredited to your country.
PLEASE SEND APPEALS IMMEDIATELY.
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Urgent Action: Jailed Iranian trade unionist requires urgent medical treatment
http://www.amnesty.org.uk/actions_details.asp?ActionID=386Urgent Action: Jailed Iranian trade unionist requires urgent medical treatment
Mahmoud Salehi has long suffered persecution by the Iranian authorities, spending several periods in prison because of their legitimate and peaceful activities as trade union activists and human rights defenders. He began his sentence on 9 April 2007. Amnesty International considers him a prisoner of conscience and is concerned for his health.
Mahmoud Salehi has long-term medical concerns. A request by his doctor in May 2007 that he be accorded specialist treatment outside the prison has been ignored. He suffers from chronic kidney disease, for which he requires dialysis. He is also said to suffer from a heart disorder. This month (December 2007) it was reported that Salehi has grave intestinal edema or swelling that may be connected with his renal disease.
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Iran students break campus gate in protest: reports
by Stuart WilliamsPublished: December 09, 2007
Iranian students chant slogans beneath pictures of fellow students detained by the authorities during a demonstration at Tehran University. Hundreds of Iranian students held a new protest at Tehran University on Sunday, damaging the main gate to allow outsiders into the campus and denouncing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's news agencies reported. (AFP)
TEHRAN (AFP) Hundreds of Iranian students held a new protest at Tehran University on Sunday, damaging the main gate to allow outsiders into the campus and denouncing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's news agencies reported.
The protesters chanted slogans against the president and carried banners calling for the release of three fellow students who have been held since May in a high-profile case, the Fars news agency and state-run IRNA reported.
"The students marched on the gate and damaged it, and this allowed several non-students to enter the campus. The students chanted slogans and carried protesting placards," IRNA reported.
"Ahmadi-Pinochet, Iran will not become Chile!" chanted the protesters, playing on the names of the Iranian president and late Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, Fars reported.
Pictures published by the student ISNA agency showed the students crowded round the main gate and bending back its iron railings to allow others through.
A dense crowd of hundreds of people then gathered inside the university grounds for the protest, the pictures showed. "Live Free or Die," read one of the banners.
The students also burned a copy of Kayhan newspaper, the mouthpiece of the clerical establishment and a bitter foe of the Iranian reformist movement, Fars said.
According to IRNA, anti-riot police were stationed outside the campus but did not intervene. The demonstration had been called by the radical wing of the Office to Foster Unity, a reformist student group, it said.
Unusually, state television's 20:30 (1700 GMT) news bulletin broadcast brief footage of the protest, showing the students yelling in excitement as they tried to open the university gate.
There has been a string of demonstrations at Tehran universities in past months as students protest against the replacement of liberal professors, at pressure on activists by the authorities and the detention of three students.
The demonstration -- the second within a week at Tehran University after dozens of students held a similar protest on Tuesday -- appeared to be one of the largest held this year.
Mehdi Arabshahi, a member of the central board of the Office to Foster Unity, said that 1,500 people joined the latest protest, although there was no confirmation of this figure from Iranian media.
"They protested against the detention of the students, the oppressive policies of the government and advocated rights for all Iranians," he told AFP, saying that the participants included liberals and ethnic Kurds.
Arabshahi said the protest lasted for more than two hours after starting at 12:00 pm (0830 GMT) and that it was peaceful.
The demonstration came a day after the intelligence ministry said it had arrested an unspecified number of people using "fake student cards to hold an illegal demonstration" at Tehran University.
The timing of those arrests was not given, but it is likely that they took place before Friday which was the annual students' day in Iran.
The case of the three detained students from Tehran's Amir Kabir University has become a major issue for the protesting students.
Held since May, the trio were given jail sentences of up to three years in October on charges of printing anti-Islamic images in four student newspapers -- accusations they vehemently deny.
Reformist leaders such as former president Mohammad Khatami have openly called for the three to be released, but hardliners have said the gravity of their crimes means they must stay behind bars.
Meanwhile, a group of Islamist students held a counter-demonstration outside the offices of the Iranian judiciary to protest against the Tehran University gathering, Fars reported.
"We are astonished that this is not prevented when they are growing bolder by the day," one demonstrator told the agency.
© 2007 Agence France-Presse
https://owa.valueoptions.com/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.metimes.com/Politics/2007/12/09/iran_students_break_campus_gate_in_protest_reports/afp/
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Iran students break campus gate in protest: reports
by Stuart WilliamsPublished: December 09, 2007
Iranian students chant slogans beneath pictures of fellow students detained by the authorities during a demonstration at Tehran University. Hundreds of Iranian students held a new protest at Tehran University on Sunday, damaging the main gate to allow outsiders into the campus and denouncing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's news agencies reported. (AFP)
TEHRAN (AFP) Hundreds of Iranian students held a new protest at Tehran University on Sunday, damaging the main gate to allow outsiders into the campus and denouncing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's news agencies reported.
The protesters chanted slogans against the president and carried banners calling for the release of three fellow students who have been held since May in a high-profile case, the Fars news agency and state-run IRNA reported.
"The students marched on the gate and damaged it, and this allowed several non-students to enter the campus. The students chanted slogans and carried protesting placards," IRNA reported.
"Ahmadi-Pinochet, Iran will not become Chile!" chanted the protesters, playing on the names of the Iranian president and late Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, Fars reported.
Pictures published by the student ISNA agency showed the students crowded round the main gate and bending back its iron railings to allow others through.
A dense crowd of hundreds of people then gathered inside the university grounds for the protest, the pictures showed. "Live Free or Die," read one of the banners.
The students also burned a copy of Kayhan newspaper, the mouthpiece of the clerical establishment and a bitter foe of the Iranian reformist movement, Fars said.
According to IRNA, anti-riot police were stationed outside the campus but did not intervene. The demonstration had been called by the radical wing of the Office to Foster Unity, a reformist student group, it said.
Unusually, state television's 20:30 (1700 GMT) news bulletin broadcast brief footage of the protest, showing the students yelling in excitement as they tried to open the university gate.
There has been a string of demonstrations at Tehran universities in past months as students protest against the replacement of liberal professors, at pressure on activists by the authorities and the detention of three students.
The demonstration -- the second within a week at Tehran University after dozens of students held a similar protest on Tuesday -- appeared to be one of the largest held this year.
Mehdi Arabshahi, a member of the central board of the Office to Foster Unity, said that 1,500 people joined the latest protest, although there was no confirmation of this figure from Iranian media.
"They protested against the detention of the students, the oppressive policies of the government and advocated rights for all Iranians," he told AFP, saying that the participants included liberals and ethnic Kurds.
Arabshahi said the protest lasted for more than two hours after starting at 12:00 pm (0830 GMT) and that it was peaceful.
The demonstration came a day after the intelligence ministry said it had arrested an unspecified number of people using "fake student cards to hold an illegal demonstration" at Tehran University.
The timing of those arrests was not given, but it is likely that they took place before Friday which was the annual students' day in Iran.
The case of the three detained students from Tehran's Amir Kabir University has become a major issue for the protesting students.
Held since May, the trio were given jail sentences of up to three years in October on charges of printing anti-Islamic images in four student newspapers -- accusations they vehemently deny.
Reformist leaders such as former president Mohammad Khatami have openly called for the three to be released, but hardliners have said the gravity of their crimes means they must stay behind bars.
Meanwhile, a group of Islamist students held a counter-demonstration outside the offices of the Iranian judiciary to protest against the Tehran University gathering, Fars reported.
"We are astonished that this is not prevented when they are growing bolder by the day," one demonstrator told the agency.
© 2007 Agence France-Presse
https://owa.valueoptions.com/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.metimes.com/Politics/2007/12/09/iran_students_break_campus_gate_in_protest_reports/afp/
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American Sociological Association letter to Iranian Authorities
December 18, 2007Ayatollah Sayyid ‘Ali Khamenei
Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran
c/o H.E. Mohammad Khazaie
Ambassador and Permanent Representative
Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations
622 Third Avenue, 34th Floor
New York, NY 10017, USA
Fax: 212-867-7086
Fax: 98-251-7774-2228
info@leader.ir
Your Excellency:
We write on behalf of the more than 14,000 members of the American Sociological
Association (ASA), a scientific society of academic and professional sociologists, to
request freedom from detention for the Iranian university students recently detained or
arrested by government security forces in Tehran, Tabriz, Ahvaz, Shiraz, and elsewhere
in Iran until their cases can be adjudicated by an appropriate court. Many of them are
being held in Evin Prison in Tehran for protesting against the Iranian government, and we
urge that they be freed.
The imprisoned persons include sociology student Jelveh Javaheri and others who
advocate for the equal rights of women. While they are in your custody, we urge you to
use your good offices to guarantee their safety and freedom to confer with legal counsel.
We urge you to determine the circumstances of their detention, drop politically motivated
charges, and secure their immediate release.
As a party to the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, Iran is required
to provide among other rights to its citizens, the: (1) Right to hold opinions without
interference (Article 19.1); (2) The right to freedom of expression; this right includes
freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds (Article 19.2); and
(3) Citizens are entitled to a fair and public hearing by a competent, independent and
impartial tribunal established by law (Article 14). Under the Constitution of the Islamic
Republic of Iran (Article 23), individuals also have the right to freedom of thought,
opinion, and speech.
As a scientific organization, with an international membership, ASA is committed to
ensuring academic freedom, free exchange of ideas, and free expression, to all scholars
including those conducting research on sociological and related comparative studies of
culture and social institutions. Without governmental assurance of such intellectual
freedoms, a nation quickly becomes universally recognized as failing to ensure superior
scholarship and unwilling to protect its intellectual status in international cultural and
scientific arenas.
We are profoundly dismayed by the arrests of these students. We are hopeful that under
your leadership Iran will respond to avoid the harm this damage to intellectual and
scientific pursuits will do to your country at home and in the international community.
We appreciate your consideration of our concerns about of this apparent breach of Iran’s
commitments under International Conventions, and we urge you to ensure that all false or
politically based charges against these students will be dropped. The leaders and
members of the American Sociological Association consider this to be a matter of great
urgency.
Sincerely,
Arne L. Kalleberg, PhD
President, American Sociological Association
Kenan Distinguished Professor, and Director of International Programs, College of Arts
& Sciences, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
Sally T. Hillsman, PhD
Executive Officer, American Sociological Association
cc: Head of the Judiciary
Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi
Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Justice Bldg., Panzdah-Khordad Square
Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran
Fax: +98-21-3390-4986, info@dadgostary-tehran.ir
President
His Excellency Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
The Presidency, Palestine Ave., Azerbaijan Intersection
Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran
dr-ahmadinejad@president.ir
Mr. Mohammad Hassan Zia’i-Far
Secretary of the Islamic Republic Human Rights Commission
Fax: +44-20-8904-5183, info@ihrc.org
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Monday, December 17, 2007
Iran: Release Women’s Rights Activists Immediately
Government Should Drop All Charges, End Harassment(New York, December 17, 2007) – Iran should drop politically motivated charges against two women’s rights activists facing trial this week because of their participation in a peaceful protest, Human Rights Watch said today. The authorities should release Jelveh Javahari and Maryam Hosseinkhah without delay.
Human Rights Watch learned that court officials have set court dates of December 18 and 19 to try Javaheri and Hosseinkhah on charges stemming from their involvement in a March 4 peaceful gathering to protest the prosecution of other women’s rights activists.They were among 26 women arrested at that time and released from detention over the following weeks.
However, authorities have been holding Hosseinkhah and Javeheri in Unit 3 of the general women’s ward of Evin prison since November 17 and December 1, respectively, on separate charges relating to their peaceful activities on behalf of the One Million Signatures Campaign to End Discrimination Against Women.
“There seems to be no end in sight to the Iranian government’s persecution of women’s rights activists,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “They are bringing new charges against women faster than they can try them.”
On November 17, Hosseinkhah responded to a written order to appear before a branch of the Revolutionary Court in Tehran in connection with her advocacy for the One Million Signatures Campaign. Officials charged her with “disturbing the public opinion” and “publishing lies” and set a heavy bail of 100 million tomans (approximately US$100,000) for her release. As a result of her inability to provide bail, authorities transferred her to Evin prison.
On December 1, Javahari responded to a written order to appear before a branch of the Revolutionary Court in Tehran, also stemming from her involvement with the One Million Signatures Campaign. The court charged her with “disturbing the public opinion,” “propaganda against the order,” and “publishing lies via the publication of false news,” and then transferred her to Evin prison. According to interviews with Javahari’s mother, which are available on the website of the One Million Signatures Campaign to End Discrimination Against Women, the court initially set a bail of 50 million tomans (approximately US$50,000) but withdrew it on grounds that investigations into the case would first have to be completed.
It is not clear if the trials on December 18 and 19 will also address the new charges against them.
Two other women’s rights activists with the One Million Signatures Campaign to End Discrimination Against Women, Ronak Safazadeh, 21, and Hana Abdi, 21, remain in detention on charges of “endangering national security.” Authorities arrested and detained Safazadeh on September 25 and Abdi on October 23 in Sanandaj, a city in the Kurdish region of northwestern Iran.
“The government has not provided a shred of evidence to suggest that Ronak Safazadeh and Hana Abdi have done anything except campaign peacefully for the rights of Iranian women,” Whitson said.
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Sunday, December 16, 2007
Upsurge in Dissident Arrests
Hamid Khosravi Tehran 12 December 2007Human rights organisations in Iran say dissidents are being targeted in an unprecedented wave of arrests and harassment. It looks very much like all-out war on anyone critical of the regime.Iranian government officials, meanwhile, insist that everything is fine and that attacks on their human rights record are merely a diplomatic weapon deployed by the West as part of the broader nuclear dispute.
In September, for instance, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told students at Columbia University in the United States that Iran was one of the most free countries in the world. Other officials have expanded on the theme, arguing the merits of "religious democracy" as an ideal political model and decrying external criticism as a form of psychological warfare.
When the European Union produced a tough report about the state of human rights in Iran, a foreign ministry spokesman responded, "These political statements are aimed at pressurising Tehran over the nuclear issue."
A member of the judiciary official, who did not want to be identified, told Mianeh that "everyone in the world knows that concerns about the state of human rights are a political instrument for exerting pressure on governments opposed to the west".
Domestically, the authorities have dealt with the troublesome question of human rights by stifling the news sources that report on it. The ILNA news agency, which carried critical reporting on political detentions despite having official status, has been closed down. The Iranian Students News Agency, ISNA, which focused on the detention of students, has undergone management changes which have radically changed its editorial policy.
For the last few years, both news agencies have been under fire from the conservatives, who viewed them as the voice of counter-revolution and hostile human rights groups. With their elimination as critical voices, the official media carry little news about the treatment of government critics.
Even so, news sources – radio and internet sites based abroad – continue to report on the issue, and the picture they paint is an alarming one, indicative of a wave of arrests and harassment of critics of the Ahmadinejad administration in the last few months.
The groups targeted in this offensive can be divided into six main groups - students, political activists, trade unionists, journalists, women's rights defenders and ethnic minority activists.
Most of the detentions appear to involve student activists, judging from the reports that have been published. The high-profile arrest in May of Ehsan Mansouri, Ahmad Ghassaban and Majid Tavakkoli from Tehran's Amir Kabir University, and especially the open letters they wrote alleging physical mistreatment in detention, led to protests from students at other institutions, who in turn were subject to arrest.
Mansouri, Ghassaban and Tavakkoli were sentenced in October to prison terms ranging from two to three years for the offence of insulting Islam and clerics.
The arrest in early November of Ali Azizi, Arman Sedaghati, Pedram Rafati, Behnam Sepehrmand and Maziar Samii was only the latest in a series of detentions of students who complained vocally about the incarceration of their three colleagues. The bulk of those arrested have been from the University of Tehran, Allameh Tabatabai University and Amir Kabir University.
In addition, dozens of members of the Office for Fostering Unity – the main student association - have been detained within the last few months, the most prominent being Mahdi Arabshahi, Ali Nikunesbati, Bahareh Hedayat, Hanif Yazdani, Mohammad Hashemi and Ali Vefqi. The Iranian Graduates' Organisation has also had its office closed and leading members detained, including Abdollah Momeni, Mojtaba Bayat, Bahram Fayyazi, Masoud Habibi, Morteza Eslahchi, Ezzat Qalandari, Ashkan Qiyasvand, Arash Khandel, Habib Haji Heydari and Saeed Hosseiniya.
Despite the tensions building up ahead of the March 2008 parliamentary election, political activists have enjoyed a period of respite from judicial detention. However, three reformist figures - Emadoddin Baqi, Javad Akbarein and Hadi Qabel – have recently been arrested, and others have received summons, particularly Qom, Esfahan, Qazvin and Tabriz.
The third category – labour activists – includes the high-profile case of Mansour Osanlu, the leader of the Tehran bus drivers' union, who was detained in July. Some of Osanlu's union colleagues have also been arrested, and there have been other detentions following labour protests in various provinces, including at the Haft Tappeh sugar factory.
Journalists detained in recent months include Masoud Bastani, Soheil Asefi and Farshad Qorbanpour, while others have received summons. In many cases, though, journalists prefer not to publicise their own problems for fear of making things worse.
Women's rights activists have also suffered harassment. Many of the news reports carried on websites and foreign radio stations have focused on the detention of activists involved in the Campaign for One Million Signatures, pressing for changes to discriminatory laws against women. Among the best-known figures detained are Delaram Ali – sentenced to 30 months in jail - Nahid Keshavarz, Sara Imanian, Mahboubeh Hosseinzadeh, Saeedeh Amin, Amir Yaqoub-Ali, Hana Abdi, Sepideh Pouraghai and Ronak Saffarzadeh. Meetings of women activists around the country have also been raided, the latest example of this involving the beating and temporary detention of 25 participants in a legal rights training workshop in Khorram Abad in September.
Finally, we come to the sixth of the categories we listed. Recent months has seen a lot of news published on the detention of ethnic community activists in places such as Kurdistan, Azerbaijan and Khuzestan. The most notable case was that of Adnan Hassanpour and Hiva Boutimar, two journalists from the Kurdish minority who were sentenced to death in July for subversion.
Many Iranians, including opposition members, are unsympathetic towards people they regard as armed separatists. For example, there was little reaction to a statement issued at the beginning of November by an Arab separatist group concerning the execution of Abdolreza Navaseri, Mohammad Ali Savari and Jafar Savari, apparently for bombings in Ahvaz, the provincial capital of Khuzestan, which were ascribed to Sunni extremists.
Reformers and human rights activists are concerned that the pattern of widespread detentions outlined above amount to a security clampdown ahead of the March election. Yet the wider public appears unmoved by the issue, in part because so little information seeps out in the mass media to which they mostly have access, such as the state broadcaster IRIB.
"Society exists in a total news blackout, and those sections of the public who are informed have been completely passive since [Mohammad] Khatami began his second term in the presidency [2001-05]," student activist Mohammad Hossein Nemati told Mianeh.
However, when high-profile human rights cases receive wide-scale domestic coverage, they can in fact receive a lot of attention and heated debate among wider Iranian society. Two good examples of this are opposition leader Akbar Ganji, who served a prison sentence from 2001 to 2006, and Zahra Kazemi, the Iranian-Canadian photojournalist who died in custody in 2003
But awareness of an issue does not automatically evince a strong public reaction. As Nemati points out, "Even when Akbar Ganji was incarcerated, and most people in society were informed about it, barely 1,500 people took part when events were staged in support of him."
In a country that is still in transition from tradition to modernity, it is understandable that the way the intellectual elite frames the concept of human rights is not going to be received in the same manner by the bulk of the population. That is not to say that Iranian society is antipathetic to human rights, but rather that other, more pressing priorities prevent the general public from thinking about and identifying with complicated ideals like freedom of speech or faith.
The apathetic majority – perhaps 60 per cent of the population - have their own reasons for being circumspect. Many feel it is best to mind one's own business whatever one thinks of the system. As one young man called Hossein, who works at Tehran's bazaar, told Mianeh, "You need to behave with discretion if you want to avoid being singled out".
The other 40 per cent, the urban educated class who follow political developments plus of course the student population, can be assumed to subscribe to the analysis that human rights groups have made of the way dissidents have been treated in recent months. This analysis runs as follows – those who want a single-party ruling establishment are trying to exploit international crises to guarantee victory for the current administration in the March legislative election. As part of this strategy, they are also seeking to make their critics and opponents completely passive.
Hamid Khosravi is a political reporter in Tehran.
This article is an abridged and translated version of the full original text published on the Farsi pages of Mianeh, with editorial adjustments agreed with the writer made to provide clarity for English-language readers.
Source: www.mianeh.net/en/articles/?aid=92
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Friday, December 14, 2007
Protest Meeting at the Association of Journalists
Objecting to the Continued Detention of Maryam HossienkhahThursday 13 December 2007
Change for Equality: A protest meeting organized by the Association of Journalists objecting to the arrest and continued detention of Maryam Hosseinkhah, journalist and women\’s rights defender will be held on Thursday December 13, 3:00-5:00pm at the offices of the Association.
Maryam Hosseinkhah is a member of the Association of Journalists and prior to her arrest had worked with Etemad, Etemad Melli, and Sarmayeh dailies.
Badr-ol-sadat Mofidi, the Secretary of the Association, explained: \"a number of journalists have through written correspondence requested that the Association host a meeting, protesting the arrest of Hosseinkhah. In the end, the Board of the Association decided to host the meeting on Thursday December 13.\"
Mofidi explained further, that: \"the Association has written a letter to Ayatollah Hashemi Shahroudi, the Head of the Judiciary, asking for the release of Maryam Hossienkhah. As reported in the news the bail amount for Maryam\’s release is set at 100 Million Tomans (Roughly 120,000 Euros). In the letter to Ayatollah Shahroudi we have asked at a minimum for his intervention in the reduction of the requested bail amount.\"
Maryam Hosseinkhah is a journalist who has written largely on women\’s issues. She was arrested on November 18, 2007 on charges of disruption of public opinion and the publication of lies. Since her arrest, Maryam Hosseinkhah has been in Evin\’s Public Ward 3. Jelve Javaheri another member of the Campaign, was also arrested on December 1, 2007 and remains in Evin Prison\’s Public Ward 3, on similar charges.
The Association of Journalists is located at: Keshavarz Blvd. Kabkanian Avenue, Seventh Street.
All press, including international press, are invited and encouraged to take part in this event.
http://www.we4change.info/english/
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Amnesty International - Iran: Urgent Action needed for students at risk
13 December 2007Arbitrary arrests/ fear of torture or ill-treatment/ possible prisoners of conscience
IRAN
Between 20 and 30 students (male and female) associated with the student group Students for Freedom and Equality (Daneshjouyan-e Azadi Khah va Beraber Talab), including:
Rosa Essaâie, (f) member of Iran's Armenian minority, student at Tehrans Amir Kabir University
Mehdi Geraylou (m), student at Tehran University
Anousheh Azadfar (f), student at Tehran University
Ilnaz Jamshidi (f), student at Free University of Central Tehran
Rouzbeh Safshekan (m), student at Tehran University
Nasim Soltan-Beigi (m), student at Allameh Tabatabai University
Yaser Pir Hayati (m), student at Shahed University
Younes Mir Hosseini (m), student at Shiraz University
Milad Moini (m), student at Mazandaran University
Between 20 and 30 students, including those named above, are being detained without charge mostly in Tehran but also other cities, following scores of demonstrations and mass student sit-ins linked to Iran's national University Students Day, 7 December. They may be prisoners of conscience, detained solely for exercising their right to freedom of expression and association, and it is feared that they could be tortured or otherwise ill-treated in detention.
Dozens of students have been detained over the last six weeks, following protests against the replacement of scores of professors and other actions apparently intended to further limit of freedom of expression on university campuses, including the banning of a number of student publications, and suspensions and expulsions of students from their places of higher education. Activists from the students' groups, the Office for Strengthening Unity (Daftar-e Tahkim-e Vahdat) and Students For Freedom and Equality (Daneshjouyan-e Azadi Khah va Beraber Talab) were said to be among those who took part in these demonstrations.
According to a report from news agency Agence France Presse (AFP) on 11 December, a spokesperson for Iran’s judiciary stated that it continues to hold up to 24 students, including some arrested in previous months; the Persian-language website: http://takravi1.blogfa.com/ features 28 names. Most of those detained in Tehran are said to be held in sections 209 and 240 of Evin Prison and others in a state intelligence unit called Daftar-e Paygiri (Follow-up Office).
The recent student demonstrations “often involving hundreds of students“ took place in Shahroud, east of Tehran; at Mazandaran University in Babolsar in the north of the country; and in Shiraz, in the south. One student in custody, Yaser Pir Hayati, is known to be a student at Tehrans Shahed University, an establishment solely for the children of Iranians killed during the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988). On 12 December, family members of those still detained gathered outside Evin prison and outside Iran's parliament building to protest against the incommunicado detention of their relatives.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Student groups have been at the forefront of demands for greater human rights in Iran in recent years. Since the election of President Ahmadinejad in 2005, there have been increasing restrictions on civil society in Iran. In April 2007, Minister of Intelligence Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejeie publicly accused student activists and campaigners for the rights of women in Iran of being part of an 'enemy conspiracy'.
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Please send appeals to arrive as quickly as possible, in Persian, English, Arabic or your own language:
- calling on the authorities to release all students detained in recent weeks if they are prisoners of conscience, held solely on account of the peaceful exercise of their rights, and for any others to be tried promptly and fairly, in accordance with international fair trial standards, on recognisably criminal charges or else released;
- seeking details of any charges brought against those in detention;
- seeking assurances that none of those arrested is subject to torture or other ill treatment;
- calling on the authorities to ensure that these detainees have unfettered access to relatives,
legal representation, and any medical attention they may require;
- reminding the authorities that confessions extracted under duress are prohibited by Article 38 of the constitution of Iran, which says that 'All forms of torture for the purpose of extracting confession or acquiring information are forbidden,' and that Iran is a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), of which Article 7 states that 'No one shall be subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment.'.
APPEALS TO:
Leader of the Islamic Republic His Excellency Ayatollah Sayed ‘Ali Khamenei The Office of the Supreme Leader, Islamic Republic Street - Shahid Keshvar Doust Street Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran Email: info@leader.ir Salutation: Your Excellency Head of the Judiciary Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi Howzeh Riyasat-e Qoveh Qazaiyeh / Office of the Head of the Judiciary Pasteur St., Vali Asr Ave., south of Serah-e Jomhouri, Tehran 1316814737, Islamic Republic of Iran Email: info@dadgostary-tehran.ir (In the subject line write: FAO Ayatollah Shahroudi) Salutation: Your Excellency Minister of Intelligence Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejeie Ministry of Intelligence, Second Negarestan Street, Pasdaran Avenue, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran Salutation: Your Excellency
COPIES TO:
President His Excellency Mahmoud Ahmadinejad The Presidency, Palestine Avenue, Azerbaijan Intersection, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran Email: dr-ahmadinejad@president.ir via website: www.president.ir/email Speaker of Parliament His Excellency Gholamali Haddad Adel Majles-e Shoura-ye Eslami, Baharestan Square, Tehran, Islamic Republic of Iran Fax: +98 21 3355 6408 Email: hadadadel@majlis.ir (Please ask that your message be brought to the attention of the Article 90 Commission) and to diplomatic representatives of Iran accredited to your country.
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