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Back
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Covering events
from January - December 2000
IRAN
Islamic Republic
of Iran
Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran: Ayatollah Sayed 'Ali Khamenei
President: Hojjatoleslam val Moslemin Sayed Mohammad Khatami
Capital: Tehran
Population: 67.7 million
Official language: Farsi (Persian)
Death penalty: retentionist
2000 treaty ratifications/signatures: Rome Statute of the International
Criminal Court
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Scores of political
prisoners continued to be held; among them were prisoners of conscience
and others sentenced in previous years after unfair trials. A clamp-down
on freedom of expression resulted in the arbitrary arrest and imprisonment
of scores of journalists. Reports of torture and ill-treatment continued.
At least 75 people were executed during 2000; the true number may
have been considerably higher.
Background
Parliamentary elections held in two stages in February and April
formed the background to the struggle concerning freedom of expression
and association. The elections were decisively won by supporters
of President Mohammad Khatami. The new authorities set out with
an ambitious program of social and political reform although only
a few such laws had been passed and implemented by the end of the
year.
New parliamentary
commissions visited prisons and critically evaluated prison conditions,
dealt with judicial reform and addressed implementation of constitutional
guarantees concerning freedom of expression.
The Press Law,
passed in April by the previous parliament, introduced harsh measures
that were used to limit freedom of expression. In August, new deputies
introduced legislation to reform the Press Law, but the reform was
halted by an unprecedented intervention into parliamentary affairs
by the Leader.
Scores of people
were arrested and injured in provincial centres thoughout the year
during civil unrest over social conditions, policing and the allocation
of resources.
Student demonstrations
occurred throughout the year. In Tehran, Tabriz and elsewhere, scores
of students commemorated the anniversary of the July 1999 demonstrations
in Tehran, while in Khorramabad, Lorestan, in August, two well-known
reformist theologians were prevented from addressing a conference
organized by a student group. Dozens of people were reportedly injured
and arrested in the disturbances which followed. Many investigations
ensued, including by parliament and the National Security Council,
which indicated that actions by Revolutionary Guard officials and
Basij (Mobilization) forces, among others, precipitated the unrest
and injuries.
The People's
Mujahideen of Iran (PMOI) continued to undertake military operations
against the authorities, including a mortar attack in February targeting
offices of the security forces in Tehran which reportedly injured
a number of civilians.
Freedom of expression
In an unprecedented clampdown on freedom of expression and association,
at least 34 journalists, writers and human rights defenders were
questioned, detained and tried; some were tortured. At least 12
were imprisoned, usually after unfair trials. These abuses occurred
as a result of complaints filed by individuals and state bodies,
often under the control of the Leader, which frequently led to legal
action against journalists and commentators. These and other people
were tried on the basis of vaguely worded laws before Revolutionary
Courts and the Special Court for the Clergy, where procedures often
fall far short of international standards for fair trial. They were
prisoners of conscience. At least 30 publications, the majority
supportive of reformist groups, were closed or suspended by judicial
order.
Newspaper articles
about the use of the death penalty resulted in the imprisonment
of two people. Latif Safari, publisher of Neshat (Happiness), was
sentenced to two-and-a-half years' imprisonment in April. In October,
the sentence of Emaddodin Baqi of the newspaper Fath (Victory),
was reduced from seven to three years on appeal. He had been detained
in May and was not freed during his appeal.
Writers who
addressed political and social reform or who were critical of the
actions of political leaders were often detained, tried and imprisoned,
frequently on vaguely worded charges.
* In August,
journalists Ahmad Zeydabadi of Hamshahri (Citizen), Mohammad Quchani
of Asr-e Azadegan (Era of the Free), and Massoud Behnoud of Gunagun
(Variety) were detained by the State Employees Court. Mohammad Quchani
was released on bail in September pending trial, and Massoud Behnoud
was released on bail in December. Ahmad Zeydabadi continued to be
held. By the end of the year their trials had not taken place.
* In November, the managing editors of Abrar (The Righteous) were
tried for ''spreading lies'' and other charges. In December the
managing editor of Ya Lesarat al-Hossein was tried in the Press
Court. The outcome of these trials was not known at the end of the
year.
* Mahmud Salehi, a trade union leader, was reportedly imprisoned
in Saqqez for six months in August in connection with trade union
activities.
The Berlin Conference
An academic conference held in Berlin in April, in which 17 Iranian
intellectuals participated, was disrupted by exiled Iranian political
groups. The conference was filmed by Iran's state broadcasting company
and shown in Iran, where it caused controversy. On return to Iran,
the participants were summoned for questioning, some were detained,
often for prolonged periods, and in October and November participants
and translators of conference papers were put on trial for their
involvement with the conference. They faced serious but vaguely
worded charges concerning ''national security'', ''propaganda against
the state'' and ''insulting Islam''. By the end of the year, no
verdicts had been announced, but the evidence used in the trials
included discourses they had delivered in Berlin, which were legally
published and available in Iran.
* Journalist
Akbar Ganji was detained on 22 April. He was held in solitary confinement
for much of the approximately 190 days he was held prior to his
trial in November, when he stated he was beaten in prison.
* Lawyer Mehrangiz Kar and publisher Shahla Lahiji - both defenders
of women's rights - and Ali Afshari, a student leader, were all
detained without charge for over two months. In November Mehrangiz
Kar was denied permission to seek medical treatment abroad for cancer.
* Researcher Hojjatoleslam Hasan Yousefi Eshkevari was arrested
after his return from Europe on 5 August. In October he was convicted
after an unfair trial by the Special Court for the Clergy. He faced
vague charges relating to ''national security'', defamation, heresy,
and being at war with God and corrupt on earth, which are punishable
by death. By the end of the year, his sentence had not been made
known.
* In December Ali Afshari and Ezzatollah Sahabi were rearrested.
Still in detention at the end of the year, they were denied the
opportunity to see their family and lawyers.
Unfair trials
Deeply flawed trial procedures, especially in Revolutionary Courts
and the Special Court for the Clergy, continued.
* On 1 July,
the Shiraz Revolutionary Court sentenced 10 Iranian Jews to between
three and 13 years' imprisonment on charges relating to spying.
Three men were acquitted. Despite repeated public assurances by
the authorities that they would be given a fair trial, proceedings
took place in secret and fell far short of international standards
for fair trial. The prison sentences for the 10 were reduced to
between two and nine years on appeal.
There were continued reports that scores, possibly hundreds, of
political prisoners, including prisoners of conscience sentenced
after unfair trials in previous years, continued to be held. Scores
of students detained following demonstrations in July 1999, including
those associated with banned or tolerated secular political parties,
continued to be held throughout the country.
* In December,
prisoner of conscience and former Deputy Prime Minister 'Abbas Amir
Entezam, aged 68, was rearrested and ordered to sign a confession.
His refusal to do so resulted in his renewed imprisonment.
Torture/ill-treatment
Torture and ill-treatment, including the judicial punishments of
flogging and amputation, continued.
* Akbar Mohammadi
and Ahmad Batebi were tortured in the Towhid detention centre. Towhid,
administered by the Ministry of Intelligence, was closed in August
2000 by order of the judiciary. Akbar Mohammadi stated that his
feet were whipped with metal cables and that he was suspended by
his limbs and repeatedly beaten. Ahmad Batebi stated that he had
been beaten while blindfolded and bound, and ordered to sign a confession.
He reportedly wrote that his head was plunged into a drain full
of excrement and held under, forcing him to inhale excrement through
his nose and into his mouth. The two men were sentenced to 15 and
10 years' imprisonment respectively.
There were continued reports of psychological torture including
death threats. No investigation into any allegations of torture
- such as those made by journalist Akbar Ganji, who stated in court
in November that he had been tortured by prison officials at Evin
- was known to have been undertaken.
At least 49
floggings were reported, many for ''depraved dancing'', and 10 amputations,
often in connection with theft. However, the true number may have
been considerably higher.
Human rights
defenders
Following a closed trial that ended in September, Shirin Ebadi and
Mohsen Rahami, human rights defenders and lawyers, received suspended
sentences and five years' suspension from practising law in connection
with the production and distribution of the videotaped ''confessions''
of Amir Farshad Ebrahimi. His videotaped testimony included statements
concerning his former group, Ansar-e Hezbollah (Partisans of the
Party of God), and how the group was instructed to break up public
meetings and beat up reformist activists. He was sentenced to two
years' imprisonment for spreading lies and was believed to be held
in conditions amounting to cruel and inhuman punishment.
The 'Serial
Murders' and impunity
In December, the trial began of 18 individuals, including former
senior Ministry of Intelligence officials, charged in connection
with their alleged involvement with the murder of two politicians
and two writers in 1998. These cases, which form part of the ''Serial
Murders'' cases, were tried in the Tehran Military Court behind
closed doors, allegedly for ''security reasons''. The specific charges
against the accused were not known. At the start of the trial, only
five defendants, said to be the main perpetrators of the killings,
were in custody, while others, suspected accomplices, were free
on bail. By 31 December, one of the defendants, Mostafa Kazemi,
had reportedly confessed to having ordered the killings. It was
not known where and under what circumstances this confession was
made. Shirin Ebadi (see above), a lawyer representing one of the
victims' families, had earlier stated that the judiciary had not
given her access to the case files and in December, a lawyer for
the families of the two writers, Nasser Zarafshan, was detained
for suggesting that other unsolved murders formed part of the case
and should be investigated and tried simultaneously. The verdicts
were expected in January.
In July, Brigadier
General Farhad Nazari and 18 officials of the Law Enforcement Forces
were acquitted by a military court of disobeying Ministry of the
Interior orders in connection with a raid on student dormitories
during the July 1999 student demonstrations. Students injured in
the raid, represented by Mohsen Rahami (see above), were, however,
compensated by the same court.
Death penalty
At least 75 executions were reported and 16 death sentences imposed,
often in connection with murder charges. However, the true number
may have been considerably higher. Death sentences passed after
the unfair trials of Akbar Mohammadi, Ahmad Batebi and two other
students detained following the student demonstrations in July 1999
- Mehrdad Sohrabi and Abbas Deldar - were commuted on 30 April.
Intergovernmental
organizations
In February, the UN General Assembly expressed its concern that
since 1996 no invitation to visit the country had been extended
by the authorities to the Special Representative on the human rights
situation in Iran. The General Assembly also expressed serious concern
at the ''apparent absence of respect for internationally recognized
safeguards, the use of national security laws as a basis for derogating
from the rights of the individual, cases of torture and cruel, inhuman
or degrading treatment or punishment as well as the failure to meet
international standards in the administration of justice'', along
with the restrictions on freedom of expression, opinion, thought
and the press.
In May, in its
concluding observations to Iran's report on implementation of the
UN Children's Convention, the monitoring committee expressed concern
at Iran's reservations to the Convention and recommended that Iran
review legislation concerning the age of majority to bring it in
line with the Convention. It expressed serious concern that the
right to life of a person under 18 is not guaranteed and that children
can be subjected to a variety of types of cruel, inhuman and degrading
treatment and punishment.
AI country statement
* Iran: Open
letter from Amnesty International to members of the Sixth Majles-e
Shoura-ye Eslami (parliament) (AI Index: MDE 13/018/2000)
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