23 December 2024, GENEVA – Independent human rights experts* today expressed serious concern at what appears to be an increase in systematic targeting of women belonging to the Baha’i religious minority throughout the country.
The experts said that Baha’i women were being targeted through arrests, summoning for interrogation, enforced disappearance, raids on homes, confiscation of personal belongings, limitations on freedom of movement and prolonged consecutive deprivations of liberty.
Baha’i women comprise two-thirds of all Baha’i prisoners in Iran, with a significant number being held without due process and with their whereabouts unknown.
“In the larger context of the targeting of women in Iran and the challenges with gender equality, this dramatic rise in persecution against Baha’i women is an alarming escalation,” the experts said. “This is affecting a group of people who face intersectional discrimination and persecution: as women and as members of the Baha’i religious minority,” they said.
The escalation comes as Baha’i women continue to be confronted with ongoing incidents of persecution faced by all Baha’is, including denial of higher education and economic and cultural restrictions, which spans their entire lives, impacting them intellectually, socially and economically as they are banned from university and public employment only for their faith.
“We are concerned at the use of ambiguously formulated accusations such as ‘threat to national security’ or ‘propaganda against the State’ to systematically restrict the peaceful exercise of their rights,” the experts said. “We are further concerned about the continued criminalisation of freedom of religion or belief, freedom of opinion and expression and the right to take part in political and cultural life, of Baha’is in the country,” they said. “This may have a significant chilling effect on other members of the Baha’i religious minority and the exercise of their human rights and freedoms,” they said.
The experts have raised their concerns with the Iranian Government. In its response, the Government asserted the full citizenship right of Baha’is and claimed they face no restrictions. In the same week as the receipt of the Government’s response, 10 Baha’i women in Isfahan were reportedly sentenced to a total of 90 years in prison, fined, banned from travel, had personal and family assets permanently confiscated, subsequent to their alleged arbitrary arrest and torture in Dolat Abad prison.
*The experts: Mai Sato, Special Rapporteur on the situation of Human Rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran; Nazila Ghanea, Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief; Reem Alsalem, Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, its causes and consequences; Laura Nyirinkindi (Chair), Claudia Flores (Vice-Chair), Dorothy Estrada Tanck, Ivana Krstić, and Haina Lu, Working group on discrimination against women and girls; Nicolas Levrat, Special Rapporteur on Minority issues; Alexandra Xanthaki, Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights; Farida Shaheed, Special Rapporteur on the right to education; Irene Khan, Special Rapporteur on the right to freedom of opinion and expression; Gina Romero, Special Rapporteur on the Rights to Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association; Gabriella Citroni (Chair-Rapporteur), Grażyna Baranowska (Vice-Chair), Aua Baldé, Ana Lorena Delgadillo Pérez and Mohammed Al-Obaidi, Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances.
The Special Rapporteurs are part of what is known as the Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council. Special Procedures, the largest body of independent experts in the UN Human Rights system, is the general name of the Council’s independent fact-finding and monitoring mechanisms that address either specific country situations or thematic issues in all parts of the world. Special Procedures experts work on a voluntary basis; they are not UN staff and do not receive a salary for their work. They are independent from any government or organisation and serve in their individual capacity.
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