Human Rights and Historical Amnesia

Reading about Iran these days is grim work.  What makes it even more disheartening is that a historical amnesia pervades much of the commentary on Iran.  Whether it is UN or NGO reports that reveal a deepening human rights crisis, or analysis by Western pundits of an upcoming presidential election no one believes will be free or fair, the emphasis is always on the latest catastrophe, with scant attention to how we arrived here in the first place.

If there is any hope of reversing Iran’s culture of impunity, and setting it on a path towards respect for human rights, this trend must change.  We must battle this amnesia and demand accountability for crimes committed long ago. 

In short, to get to a democratic future for Iran, it is essential that we revisit its painful past.  More …

Why Iranian Women Can’t Have Any of It

In recent weeks, the political theater of women registering as presidential candidates in the Islamic Republic of Iran, followed by what appeared to be disqualifying remarks by Ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi—a conservative cleric—has distracted from the real issues at hand. 

Regardless of whether Yazdi’s remarks that women cannot run for president of the Islamic Republic can be attributed as an official pronouncement of the Guardian Council—the 12-member body that Yazdi is a member of and which is charged with vetting election candidates according to their Islamic credentials—it matters precious little for the women that make up more than half of Iran’s total population of around 77 million people. More …

Nationalism & Human Rights in Iran in Historical Context

In an influential article written in a leading Iranian intellectual magazine, the lay religious philosopher, Abdolkarim Soroush argued emphatically that a “religion that is oblivious to human rights…is not tenable in the modern world.”¹ Writing in the 1990s, a full decade and a half after the triumph of the Islamic Revolution, Soroush, along with other thinkers, was in the throes of a rigorous critique of the Islamic Republic that would provide the intellectual justification for the Reform movement which emerged with such vigour with the landslide election of Mohammad Khatami in 1997. For Soroush, the critical fault line in successive Iranian states, the Islamic Republic included, was a surfeit of ‘obligations’ and an absence of ‘rights’. In sum, the Iranian citizen remained an abstract concept, not a legal one. Unsurprisingly, Soroush’s critique invited considerable criticism from conservatives disturbed by his assault on religious orthodoxy. As if to underline the seriousness with which they objected to Soroush’s comments, a number drew unfavourable comparisons with the nationalist intellectual, Ahmad Kasravi. More …

The Key to Religious Freedom in Iran

It is a well-known fact that religious minorities in the Islamic Republic of Iran face severe restrictions on their freedom to believe, teach, and practice their religions. Iran engages in “systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom, including prolonged detention, torture, and executions based primarily or entirely upon the religion of the accused,” according to a 2013 report by the U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom. Prof Heiner Bielefeldt, the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, has referred to “the current climate of fear in which many churches operate,” and described the situation of the Baha’i community as “one of the most obvious cases of state persecution.” Common legal charges include “insulting Islam,” deviating from Islamic standards, and the most serious: “waging war against God.” Iran has earned the opprobrium of the international community for its persecution of religious minorities and the climate of impunity that surrounds attacks by non-state actors. More …