NEW YORK: The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) welcomed the UN’s decision to appoint a human rights investigator for Iran. “The international community has finally taken action to help protect the human rights of the Iranian people,” said Jamal Abdi, policy director for NIAC.
“This concrete measure sends a powerful message to the government of Iran that the world will not turn a blind eye to its human rights violations.” The UN decision to appoint a human rights investigator for Iran came amid revelations of serious human rights abuses in the Iranian prisons. Iran has violently cracked down on political dissidents who are demanding change in the country’s cleric led form of government.
Scores of human rights activists, political dissidents, lawyers, and religious minorities have been rounded up by the Islamic Republic’s security agents and forced to endure torture in the hands of their interrogators. According to Aaron Rhodes of International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, “the Iranian Judiciary is on an execution binge orchestrated by the intelligence and security agencies”. Iranian judges are widely believed to lack independence and their decisions are frequently subordinated to the wishes of security agencies. The actual number of prisoners executed in Iran is difficult to verify but many believe is higher than is reported. Mass executions are sometimes carried out in Iranian prisons.
This year, more than hundred people were executed in a mass hanging in Vakilabad prison, according to International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. The UN’s Human Rights Council regretted Iran’s poor record and lack of cooperation in curbing human rights abuses in the Islamic Republic. The US and its partners campaign heavily for the appointment of a special rapporteur to monitor the Islamic Republic.
The U.S. Ambassador to the UN, Eileen Donahoe, said America and its allies are "gravely concerned at the situation in Iran, where respect for human rights has deteriorated dramatically in recent years." For its part, the Islamic Republic has rejected the need for appointment of special rapporteur, calling it political grand standing by the West. A spokesman for the Iranian foreign ministry said the UN’s decision is "unjust, unjustifiable, and totally political." He said the UN’s decision is aimed at diverting attention from human rights violations in the western countries, particularly in the United States. The UN Council on Human Rights was established in 2006. The United States became a signatory in 2009.