Public Statement by Women’s Forum Against Fundamentalism in Iran
FOR IMMIDIATE RELEASE
ACTION ALERT
CONTACT: press@wfafi.org
BOSTON, MA- -On March 26th, 2007 the U.N. Human Rights Council voted to end a routine monitor of the status of human rights in Iran. This vote was based on the recommendation presented by the Five- Nation panel to the Council, mostly notorious violators of human rights themselves. Such travesty is in contrast with the views of the U.N. General Assembly that strongly condemned Tehran’s regime for systematic violations of human rights in December 2006.
For the past 28 years, Tehran’s fundamentalist regime maintains the highest number of female executions in the world. Thousands of political prisoners, among them pregnant women, teenage girls and grandmothers, have been executed publicly and privately in notorious prisons such as Evin in Tehran, Gohardasht, Tabriz, Mashad, Esfahan, Shiraz, Ahwaz and other major cities. According to Tehran’s own account, 189 prisoners were hanged in 2006, including women and minors. Last year a total of 1,250,000 people were arrested in Iran. Peaceful demonstrations of women, students, teachers, bus drivers, labor unions and ethnic minorities were violently suppressed and hundreds arrested and imprisoned.
Currently, there are eight women sentenced to death by stoning and 32 facing execution by other means, five of them are below the age of 20.
While Tehran’s regime practices stoning, public hanging, amputations of limbs or gouging of eyes as forms of punishment, UN Human Rights Council calls off the routine monitoring of the status of human rights in Iran. This is a tragedy and disgrace for humanity. The Council is in charge of advocating and safeguarding human rights, not turning a blind eye and rewarding the violators.
Women’s Forum Against Fundamentalism in Iran (WFAFI) denounces the Council’s decision and consider their vote as endorsing Tehran’s gender apartheid regime. WFAFI calls upon the human rights organizations, officials and governments to protest this decision by the U.N. Human Rights Council. By ignoring the flagrant human rights violations in Iran, the Council emboldens the fundamentalist regime and encourages escalation of suppression. WFAFI also urges the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights to step in and assign a Special Rapporteur to monitor the situation of human rights in Iran.
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Lee Amendment: RIP
The Like Maria Said Paz blog has a provocative response to my piece last week about the peace movement’s attitude towards women. She writes,
“You will never hear about attacks on women from MoveOn. They’re too busy burying their noses into the skivies of the military in their jingoistic efforts…when you worship the military to avoid being called unpatriotic, you can’t speak out for the victims of militarization.”
I think that about sums it up. I too have been struggling with the collapse of the Lee amendment to the Iraq war funding bill that the House just passed. What Move On did was heinous, but the real truth is that the Dems have sold the voters who propelled them into office down the river. What remarkable chutzpah to solemnly and sanctimoniously tell us that not supporting a bill that funds Bush’s illegal war would be a vote for Bush. Truly Orwell could not come up with a better example of doublespeak.
Stephen Colbert issued an interesting challenge to Dems last week. He provided them a list of reasons to impeach Bush To wit:
He ended with this, “I think what the President is saying is that if you don’t impeach me now you guys, you are all a bunch of pussies.” I’m not sure that I would put it that way :-), but truly, how many times does one president have to break the law to be impeached, surely this must be an all-time record. Interesting note–Colbert’s comedic knife apparently cut a little too close to home for the audience, the laughter and applause was distinctly tempered.