AFP

STRASBOURG (AFP)The European Court of Human Rights held unanimously yesterday that repatriating a woman from Turkey to Iran, where she is sentenced to receive 100 lashes, would violate her human rights.
The seven judges, including one from Turkey, ruled that deporting the woman – identified in the judgment simply as “P.S.” – to face such a punishment in her homeland would constitute “inhuman treatment”.

The star-crossed story of P.S. began in Iran a decade ago when, as a 20-year-old Shia Muslim, she fell in love with a slightly older Sunni Muslim of Kurdish origin. Her brother and father, both members of the Iran’s intelligence service, vehemently opposed their proposed marriage, so the couple eloped, a violation of strict Islamic Sharia law.

Two days after their wedding on September 26, 1996 the newlyweds were arrested, and P.S. was forced to undergo a virginity test. An Islamic court voided the marriage and fined the ill-fated lovers 30,000 rials each. The sum – roughly equivalent to $3 – was symbolic, but the punishment was not: 100 lashes in public for both P.S. and her husband A.D., even though they had since remarried in a Shia ceremony with her father’s blessing.

Because they were condemned for “fornication”, the “sentence fell into the category known as ‘haad,’ meaning that it is irrevocable,” the judgment by the European Court of Human Rights, the tribunal of the Council of Europe, explained.

A.D. received his whipping a few months later, but P.S.’s corporeal punishment was delayed, at first because she was pregnant, and then later due to frail health. When no further postponement was possible, she fled in 1999 with her daughter and husband to Turkey, where they applied for asylum at the local office of the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

In 2003 the family was denied permanent refugee status, and Turkey’s immigration service issued an order for deportation. That is when P.S. appealed to the Strasbourg-based human rights court.
In Iran corporal punishment is “the standard penalty for certain categories of offences regarded as immoral, such as adultery and fornication,” the court noted in making it ruling.

“The Court considered that the mere fact of permitting a human being to commit such physical violence against a fellow human being, and in public moreover, was sufficient for it to classify the sentence imposed on P.S. as ‘inhuman’,” the court said.

NCRI – A man was executed in Zabol Prison according to state-run news agency Irna on June 20. Zabol, a major city in Sistan-Baluchistan province in southeast Iran has been the scene of clashes between suppressive forces and local groups opposed to the regime in recent months. In order to bring the situation under control the regime has resorted to widespread arrests and a number of those arrested in clashes have been hanged some in public.

Gholam Qaljani, son of Kajir, was accused of armed clashes with security forces and sentenced to two times execution.

Aftab-e Yazd daily also reported on June 18 that a man identified by his first name Ebrahim has been sentenced to death in Tehran.

Iran Focus– The participation by Tehran’s notorious chief prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi at the first session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva has drawn international outrage.

On Wednesday, Canadian Foreign Minister Peter MacKay said, “The presence of Mr. Mortazavi in Iran’s delegation demonstrates the government of Iran’s complete contempt for internationally recognised principles of human rights. The Government of Canada expresses its disgust at the fact that Iran would choose to include such a person in its delegation to a new UN body intended to promote the highest standards of respect for human rights”.

MacKay said that by including Mortazavi in its delegation Tehran was trying to discredit the UN council.

“Two official Iranian government investigations found that Prosecutor General Mortazavi ordered the illegal arrest and detention of Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi, which led to her torture and death. He then falsified documents to cover up his involvement in her case. Mr. Mortazavi has also been involved in the harsh clampdown on the Iranian press and the arrests of many Iranian journalists”, the Canadian Foreign Minister said.

In a letter to Luis Alfonso de Alba, the President of the UN Human Rights Council, Mohammad Mohaddessin, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the opposition National Council of Resistance of Iran, said that he was shocked and dismayed at Mortazavi’s presence.

“By all standards, Mortazavi is a criminal against humanity. His direct involvement in the suppression of all voices of dissident in Iran is common knowledge. At the time of Mohammad Khatami’s presidency, Mortazavi, in his capacity as the Media Judge, shut down 80 papers close to the ‘reformists’ and was directly involved in all the crimes of the recent years against the Iranian people. Last fall, he ordered the implementation of the sweeping ‘Zafar’ plan in Tehran in which 2,000 young people in different districts were arrested and imprisoned. In January 2006, he was responsible for a crackdown on the Tehran's transit workers who went on strike for their overdue wages”, Mohaddessin said.

“I urge the Human Rights Council to expel this criminal and call on the Swiss Judiciary issue an arrest warrant for him, so that he is brought before a competent international tribunal for crimes perpetrated against humanity”, he added.

Separately, the U.S.-based Mission for Establishment of Human Rights in Iran (MEHR IRAN) said that it was a “mockery of human rights” if Mortazavi was allowed to attend the council’s current session.

“He is responsible for numerous imprisonment, tortures and executions in Iran and should be arrested by Swiss judiciary and be tried for crimes against humanity utilising all available international avenues including the International Court of Justice, International Criminal Court and treaties such as Convention Against Torture”, the group said.

On Thursday, François Bugingo, the president of the press freedoms organisation Reporters Without Borders (RSF), said “The presence in Geneva of Mortazavi, a man who was directly involved in the death of Canadian-Iranian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi, is absolutely unacceptable.

Kazemi was arrested on 23 June 2003 while photographing the families of prisoners outside Evin Prison, north of Tehran. Tortured while in detention, she died from her injuries on 10 July 2003.

“By sending Said Mortazavi as a human rights delegate to Geneva, the Iranian government is showing its real face”, Kazemi’s son, Stephan Hachemi, said.

“Iran continues to be the Middle East’s biggest prison for journalists and bloggers, with 13 jailed last year. Threats, interrogation, summonses, arrests and arbitrary detention are all on the increase. Journalists often manage to stay out of prison only by paying very high bail. The situation has not improved since hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took over as president”, RSF said.

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
PRESS RELEASE
AI Index: MDE 16/007/2006 (Public)
News Service No: 161
22 June 2006

Amnesty International is calling on the Jordanian government to investigate allegations that Jordanian security forces used excessive force against members of a group of Iranian Kurdish refugees who, on 14 June 2006, held a peaceful protest against their living conditions and calling for their re-settlement in a safe third country. According to reports, they were attacked by Jordanian security forces in the so-called No Man’s Land (NML) desert area between the borders of Iraq and Jordan, where they have been living in harsh conditions, since January 2005. Several of the refugees, including a pregnant woman, are reported to have been injured when they were beaten with sticks by Jordanian security officials. One of the refugees is also reported to have been taken into Jordanian custody and badly beaten before being released.

Amnesty International urges the Jordanian authorities to establish a prompt and independent investigation into these allegations and, if they prove to be well-founded, to ensure that any Jordanian officials responsible for ordering or using excessive force are held to account. As well, the government should ensure that all Jordanian law enforcement bodies are instructed clearly that they must act in conformity with Jordan’s international human rights obligations and standards on the use of force, including the United Nations Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms. In recent years Amnesty International has received some reports of Jordanian security forces beating and arresting peaceful demonstrators who are perceived as critics of government policies including members of the Professional Associations and Palestinian refugees.

Background

This group of 183 Iranian Kurdish refugees had been resident in Iraq for almost 30 years. They lived at the al-Tash camp, located near Ramadi in central Iraq, until they left, along with other refugees resident there, due to growing concerns about their safety in Iraq. In January 2005, they arrived at the border with Jordan but were denied entry by Jordanian officials, although some 743 other refugees were admitted to Jordan during 2005. Since then the 183 refugees have remained on the Iraqi side of the NML, living in tents and surviving mostly on assistance and goods brought or donated by travellers passing along the highway connecting Iraq and Jordan. The refugees do not wish to be relocated to Iraq’s Kurdish autonomous area, reportedly because they fear that they would be at risk from Iranian security agents who they believe to be active in the area.

As the refugees are residing on the Iraqi side of the NML, Iraq has primary responsibility to ensure that the refugees are safe and have access to adequate food, water, shelter, and medical assistance. However, Jordan also has a responsibility to protect them when they enter areas of the NML under Jordanian jurisdiction.

Iraq, Jordan and other countries in the region should make all possible efforts as soon as possible, through cooperation with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), to find a timely, viable and durable solution for these refugees, ensuring that they are able to settle as soon as possible in a country in safety and dignity.

In March, over one hundred Palestinian refugees were stranded for several weeks near the Iraqi/Jordanian border after fleeing the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, where many of the group had lived for decades, following an increase in killings and "disappearances" of Palestinians living there. Jordan denied the group entry to Jordanian territory, in violation of its obligations under international law. Under the internationally-recognized principle of non-refoulement, Jordan has an obligation not to reject individuals at its borders if they are fleeing a country where they risk persecution or where their life or freedom is at risk. The group was later re-settled in Syria.

Over the years Jordan has hosted huge numbers of refugees. Approximately two-thirds of its population are of Palestinian-origin who fled their homes since the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. In recent years hundreds of thousands of Iraqis left their country to live in Jordan.

Public Document
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