2024-04-09 07:18:38
On December 30, 2023, Sholeh Shahidi and her two sons, Faran and Shayan Sanaie, were sentenced to prison sentences, financial fines and deprivation of social assistance. In a stormy episode, the government of Iran accused them of “educational and propaganda activity that is deviant, contrary or disturbing to the sacred islamic law”.
The family is part of the Bahá’í minority and religious groupwhich for decades have suffered systematic repression of the authorities. Human Rights Watch has qualified these and hundreds of other grievances as equivalent to crimes of persecution against humanity.
Report
In his most recent report, The Boot on My Neck: The Crime of Persecution by Iranian Authorities Against Bahá’ís in IranHuman Rights Watch documented the Iranian authorities’ systematic violation of the fundamental rights of members of the Bahá’í community through discriminatory laws and policies targeting them.
The organization, which defends the rights of people in 100 countries around the world and highlights abuses and brings perpetrators to justice, found that Bahá’ís face a spectrum of abuses, as government agencies arrest and imprison arbitrarily target Bahá’ís, confiscate their property, restrict their educational and employment opportunities, and even deny them a proper burial.
From New York, Michael Pagedeputy director for middle East of Human Rights Watch, and other authorities, offered an online press conference in which THE DEBATE was present.
Michael Page added that the Iranian authorities deprive Bahá’ís of their rights fundamental in all aspects of their lives, not because of their actions, but simply because they belong to a religious group.
“It is vitally important to increase international pressure on Iran to end this crime against humanity,” he said.
Repression
The report’s findings are based on extensive documentation by Human Rights Watch and Iranian human rights groups of violations against Bahá’ís in Iran.
Researchers reviewed government policies, court documents and communications with Bahá’ís and accessed the information through the Archive of the Bahá’ís. Persecution of Bahá’ís in Iran and documents from the Human Rights Activists News Agency.
In the early years after the revolution, Iranian state violence against the Bahá’í community was particularly harsh.
It is estimated that authorities executed or forcibly disappeared more than 200 people who were Bahá’ís, including influential members of the community or those who served in Bahá’í institutions. Thousands more were arrested, kicked out of their jobs or forced to leave the country.
Properties
While other unrecognized religious minorities in Iran, including the Yarsani, who live mainly in Kurdish areas of Iran and Iraqalso face discriminatory restrictions.
Iranian authorities have often attacked Bahá’ís for their repressive policies.
During the summer of 2022 alone, authorities raided dozens of Baha’i homes and arrested at least 30 people, including Fariba Kamalabadi and Mahvash Sabet, two prominent members of the Baha’i community who previously spent 10 years in prison.
Over the past four decades, Iranian authorities have used various laws and policies to confiscate at least hundreds of properties belonging to Bahá’ís.
In 2006, the Special Rapporteur of the HIM on adequate housing reported that authorities Iranians had confiscated approximately 640 properties belonging to Bahá’ís since 1980. According to the Human Rights News Agency (HRANA) and BIC, during the 2022-2023 academic year, at least 64 Bahá’í students were unable to take the national entrance examination results from the official website.
Laws
Since 1979, the Islamic Republic of Iran has interpreted vague national security laws to label Bahá’ís as a proscribed religious minority, calling them a threat to national security. Human Rights Watch reveals in its report that this systematic and sustained repression deliberately deprives Bahá’ís of their basic rights, which constitutes the crime of persecution against humanity.
The Rome Statute, the founding treaty of the International Criminal Court, defines persecution as the intentional and serious deprivation of fundamental rights contrary to international law on the basis of “the identity of the group or collectivity,” including for national, religious or ethnic reasons. .
Under international law, crimes against humanity are some of the most serious crimes committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack.
Escape
Bahá’ís who spoke to Human Rights Watch described their persecution as a series of violations that begin with their first encounters with the Iranian state and affect all aspects of their lives, including education, employment, and marriage. Negar Sabet, 38, shared that when she left Iran to continue her education, she had no intention of emigrating.
“But my experience at university abroad was very different, as if for the first time a weight had been lifted from my shoulders and the boot on my neck had disappeared… There, abroad, I experienced a strange freedom, and for the first time, At that time, I was the same as other people and no one walked away from me,” he shared.
Called
At the press conference were Michael Page, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Middle East and North Africa Division; Simin Fahandej, representative of the Bahá’í International Community before the United Nations in Geneva; Sepehr Atefi, Iranian Bahá’í journalist and filmmaker, and Aryan Yazdani, Iranian Bahá’í.
“The systematic oppression of Bahá’ís by the Iranian government casts a shadow over every aspect of their lives and is a disturbing testament to its discriminatory treatment of religious and ethnic minorities, leaving no aspect of their lives free from injustice. ”said Michael Page.
Together they also called for the member states of the United Nations support accountability measures, including national investigation and prosecution under the principle of universal jurisdiction, and renew the mandate of the UN Fact-Finding Mission.
Movements
The UN Human Rights Council established the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Islamic Republic of Iran on November 24, 2022, to investigate alleged human rights violations related to the protests that began on September 16, 2022, following the death of Mahsa Amini, the 22-year-old Iranian-Kurdish woman, in the custody of the country’s Moral Police, especially with respect to women and children. The fact created the international movement Woman, Life and Freedom.
CONTEXT
They desecrate even graves as a measure of persecution
According to the Bahá’í International Communityin March 2024, more than 30 new graves of deceased and buried Bahá’ís in Tehran They have been destroyed by the Iranian authorities and the tombstones have been removed, in addition to the use of bulldozers to level the resting places.
Work was carried out to make it appear that there were no new graves in the area. In an international complaint, it has been reported that the government of Iran has used this site to forcibly bury Bahá’ís for the past two years, without allowing families to be present or respecting Bahá’í funeral practices.
The grave desecration has been a constant feature of the Iranian government’s 45-year campaign of systematic persecution against Bahá’ís and follows years of harassment that continues to the death.
Simin Fahandej, representative of the Bahá’í International Community to the United Nations in Geneva, charged that razing these new tombs represents an inhumane and unprecedented attack against the Bahá’í community in Iran.
The remains of these Bahá’ís had been buried in recent months, while previous destructions of Bahá’í cemeteries were directed at sites that were several decades old.
2024-04-09 07:18:38