This post updates automatically during the course of the day. Additional updates (from other sources) are provided below in other posts...

http://enduringamerica.com/2010/05/30/the-latest-from-iran-30-may-pressure-counter-pressure/

<table bgcolor="#ffffff" border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><th colspan="2" dir="ltr" align="left">Turkey condemns Western dismissal of Tehran nuclear agreement </th></tr> <tr><td colspan="2" dir="ltr"> Source: Radio Zamaneh (http://radiozamaneh.com/enzam/)
Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan slammed Western attitude toward the Iranian nuclear-swap deal brokered by Brazil and Turkey.
http://www.payvand.com/news/09/oct/Recep-Tayyip-Erdogan2.jpgTurkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan
October 2009 file photo
In a trip to Brazil, Erdogan addressed Western countries in a press conference condemning the "wrong and dishonest" double standards in their approach to Iran's nuclear dossier.

He condemned Western support for Israel which he claimed is the only possessor of nuclear arsenals in the Middle East. He added that the Tehran Agreement poses no danger for the world but rather prevents possible dangerous actions in the future.

This week, 189 member nations of Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty called on Israel to join the treaty which would commit Israel to getting rid of its nuclear warheads. Israel has declined the request.

Erdogan also criticized the change in Nicolai Sarkozy's stance after the signing of the Tehran Agreement saying: "Mr. Sarkozy has said earlier that France would deliver the enriched uranium to Iran within ten months. But now he claims that it cannot be delivered any earlier than two years. This is not understandable."

Both Turkey and Brazil have criticized US attitude toward the Tehran Agreement in the recent days and condemned its persistence in enforcing further international sanctions against Iran.

Hilary Clinton claims that the agreement has been signed merely to buy time at a time when the Security Council is on the verge of approving the renewed sanctions.
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<table bgcolor="#ffffff" border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><th colspan="2" dir="ltr" align="left">Rebalancing The World </th></tr> <tr><td colspan="2" dir="ltr"> By Richard Falk (Source: My Catbird Seat (http://mycatbirdseat.com/2010/05/richard-falk-rebalancing-the-world/))
May 17th was the day that the Brazilian/Turkish initiative bore fruit in Tehran, with Iran agreeing to a ten-point arrangement designed to defuse the mounting confrontation with the United States and Israel with regard to its enrichment facilities.
http://www.payvand.com/news/10/may/Iran-Turkey-Brazil-nuclear-agreement3.jpg
from left: Brazil's FM & President, Iranian FM & President, Turkish PM & FM celebrate the nuclear fuel swap agreement signed in Tehran on May 17, 2010
10-point nuclear deal between Iran, Turkey and Brazil (http://www.payvand.com/news/10/may/1185.html)
It may turn out that May 17, 2010 will be remembered as an important milestone on the road to a real new world order. Remember that the phrase 'new world order' came to prominence in 1990 after Iraq's invasion and annexation of Kuwait. It was used by George W. H. Bush, the elder of the two Bush presidents, to signify the possibility after the end of the Cold War to find a consensus within the UN Security Council enabling a unified response to aggressive war. The new world order turned out to be a mobilizing idea invoked for a particular situation. The United States did not want to create expectations that it would always be available to lead a coalition against would be breakers of world peace. The whole undertaking of a 'new world order' disappeared from diplomacy right after the First Gulf War of 1991. What one wonders now is whether the Brazilian/Turkish effort to resolve the Iran nuclear crisis with the West is not expressive of a new world, this time a 'real new world order.'
May 17th was the day that the Brazilian/Turkish initiative bore fruit in Tehran, with Iran agreeing to a ten-point arrangement designed to defuse the mounting confrontation with the United States and Israel with regard to its enrichment facilities. The essence of the deal was that Iran would ship 1200 kilograms of low enriched uranium (LEU) to Turkey for deposit, and receive in return 120 kilograms of uranium enriched to 20% for use in an Iranian nuclear reactor devoted to medical research. The agreement reaffirmed support for the Non-Proliferation Treaty, as well as acknowledged Iran's right under the treaty to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, which meant the entire fuel cycle, including the enrichment phase.
The bargain negotiated in Tehran closely resembled an arrangement reached some months earlier in which Iran had agreed to turn over a similar amount of low enriched uranium to France and Russia in exchange for their promise of providing fuel rods that could be used in the same medical research reactor. That earlier deal floundered as Iran raised political objections, and then withdrew. The United States had welcomed this earlier arrangement as a desirable confidence-building step toward resolving the underlying conflict, but it wasted no time repudiating the May 17^th agreement, which seemed so similar.
Why the discrepancy in the American response? It is true that in recent months Iran has increased its LEU production, making 1200 kg of its existing stockpile amount to 50% of its total rather than the 80% that would have been transferred in the earlier arrangement. Also, there were some unspecified features in the May 17^th plan, including how the enriched uranium would be provided to Iran, and whether there would be a system of verification as to its use. In this regard, it would have seemed appropriate if genuinely troubled by this for Washington to request Iran to transfer a larger quantity of LEU and to spell out the details, but this is not what happened.
Instead of welcoming this notable effort to reduce regional tensions, the Brazilian/Turkish initiative was immediately branded as an amateurish irrelevance by the American Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton. She insisted that the concerns about Iranian nuclear enrichment be left exclusively in the hands of the 'major powers,' and immediately rallied China and Russia (in addition to France and the United Kingdom) to support a fourth round of punitive sanctions that were to be presented to the UN Security Council in the near future. It now appears that the five permanent members of the Security Council will support this intensification of sanctions that is expected to call for an arms embargo on heavy weapons, travel restrictions on Iranian officials, a boycott of banks and companies listed as linked to Iran's nuclear and missile programs, and authority to search ships to and from Iran suspected of carrying prohibited items. Such a resolution if implemented would certainly increase tensions in the Middle East without any discouragement of the Iranian nuclear program. Indeed a new round of sanctions would almost certainly increase Iran's incentives to exercise its full rights under the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and complete its development of the complete fuel cycle as has been previously done by several other parties to the treaty, including Japan, Germany, and The Netherlands.
Given the generally constructive character of the agreement reached in Tehran, the uncompromisingly hostile reaction in Washington can only be understood in one of two ways, neither of which is reassuring. If the U.S. Government, with or without Israeli prodding, had already resolved to impose sanctions, then any development that seems to cast doubt on such a coercive approach would be regarded as unwelcome. The evidence strongly suggests that the United States was determined to go forward with additional sanctions. This made the Brazil/Turkey initiative seem like a deliberate obstruction that was essentially resented as it has been reported that American leaders tried in talk Brasilia and Ankara out of making any independent steps to resolve the crisis.
Perhaps, the more weighty explanation of the hostile response has to do with the changing cast of players in the geopolitical power game. If this reasoning is correct, then the United States angry response was intended to deliver a reprimand to Brazil and Turkey, warning them to leave questions pertaining to nuclear weapons in the hands of what Hilary Clinton called 'the major powers.' In effect, the non-Western world should have no say in shaping global security policy, and any attempt to do so would be rebuffed in the strongest possible terms.
Yet the world of 2010 is very different from what it was in the late 20^th century. Globalization, the decline of American power, and the rise of non-Western states have changed the landscape. This process has recently accelerated as a result of the world economic crisis, and the difficulties in the Euro zone. As the famous Bob Dylan 1960's song goes, "The times, they are a-changing." Recall that it was not long ago that the G-8 was scrapped in favor of the more inclusive G-20. Recently, as well, much attention has been given to the rise of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) countries. What seems most at stake in this attempt to supersede and nullify the Iran deal is banishing the Brazilian and Turkish intruders from the geopolitical playing field. For the West to claim that the Security Council remains representative of the arrangement of power in 2010 is ludicrous. The identity of the five permanent members has not been altered since 1945, which is a misguided effort to overlook the fundamental shifts in world power that have taken place in recent decades. Both Brazil and Turkey were elected to be non-permanent two year members of the Security Council, which both governments interpret as conferring a special responsibility to work for peace and justice in the world. AS the May 17^th agreement shows, these governments possess the political will to make a difference in world politics.
Further, this is not just a childish ploy to grab a few headlines and tweak the old guard. The confrontation with Iran is exceedingly dangerous, agitated by Israel's periodic threats of launching a military attack and reports of pushing the United States in an escalating direction. Such a strategy of tension could easily produce a devastating regional war, disrupting the world economy, and causing widespread human suffering. Both Brazil and Turkey have strong national interests in working for regional peace and security, and one way to do this is to calm the diplomatic waters with regard to Iran's contested nuclear program. The fact that Iran seems prepared to go ahead with the agreement, at least if the UN refrains from further sanctions, strongly favors giving the deal a chance to succeed, or at worst, working to make it more reassuring to those countries that suspect Iran of secretly planning to become a nuclear weapons state.
The concern about Iran seems genuine in many quarters, given the inflammatory language sometimes used by President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and considering the repressive internal practices in Iran. At the same time, even in this regard the United States leadership has rather dirty hands. While insisting that Iran cannot be allowed to do what several other non-nuclear states have already done in conformity with Non-Proliferation Treaty, the United States has acknowledged that it has been engaged in a variety of military activities under Pentagon auspices within Iranian territory. (For confirmation see Mark Mazzeti, "U.S. Is Said to Expand Secret Actions in Mideast," NY Times, May 24, 2010). Also, it is impossible to overlook the dispiriting silence that has long insulated Israel's nuclear weapons arsenal from scrutiny and censure, as well as the closely related refusal of the Western powers to back proposals put forward by Egypt and others for a nuclear free Middle East.
Back in 2003 Donald Rumsfeld, then Secretary of Defense, made headlines by contrasting 'Old Europe' (especially France and Germany) that he denigrated as decadent because it opposed the invasion of Iraq, and 'New Europe' that was the flourishing wave of the future in Eastern Europe that favored American policy. Now it is Old Europe that is again partnering with the United States, and so restored to the good graces of Washington. In this sense, Brazil and Turkey are being treated as trespassers who refuse to absent themselves from any further engagement in Middle East diplomacy.
Perhaps, we are witnessing the passing of an era in world politics, which has not yet been acknowledged. It is two decades since Charles Krauthammer, writing in Foreign Affairs, declared that "The immediate post-Cold War world is not multipolar. It is unipolar. The center of world power is the unchallenged superpower, the United States, attended by its Western allies." The abrupt rejection of the Brazil/Turkey initiative can probably best understood as a nostalgic clinging to the 'unipolar moment' long after its reality has passed into history.
Turkey has already demonstrated the enormous gains for itself and the region arising from the pursuit of an independent and activist foreign policy based on resolving conflicts and reducing tensions to the extent possible, with benefits for peace, stability, and prosperity. Not all of its initiatives have met with success. It tried to encourage the world to treat Hamas as a political actor after it fairly won elections in Gaza back in January 2006, but was rebuffed by Washington and Tel Aviv. Similarly, it brought to bear its mediating skill in trying to broker a peace deal between Israel and Syria, only to have the process break down after a series of promising negotiating rounds. Maybe also the Brazil/Turkey initiative will be effectively beaten down, but that would not mean it was not worth trying, or that such governments should not keep trying to supplant war and militarism with diplomacy and cooperative international relations. Outside of Western diplomatic circles it is already widely appreciated that the May 17^th agreement reveals the exciting reality of a new geopolitical landscape in which the countries of the global South are now beginning to act as subjects, and no longer content to be mere objects in scenarios devised in the North. At some point this reality might well be christened as the 'real new world order'!
About: Richard Falk, Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and author of "Crimes of War: Iraq" and "The Costs of War: International Law, the UN, and World Order after Iraq" Also, current UN Rapporteur for Palestine.
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<table bgcolor="#ffffff" border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tbody><tr><th colspan="2" dir="ltr" align="left">Detained Iranian writer decries treatment of prisoners at Evin Prison </th></tr> <tr><td colspan="2" dir="ltr"> Source: Radio Zamaneh (http://radiozamaneh.com/enzam/)

Detained Iranian filmmaker and journalist described Evin Prison as the "Second Kahrizak" in a letter (http://www.facebook.com/notes/mir-hossein-mousavi-myr-hsyn-mwswy/yaddasht-mhmd-nwry-zad-az-awyn-dastan-gft-w-gwy-mn-w-dadstan-mohammad-nourizads-/396022902605) to the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei.
http://payvand.com/news/10/may/Free-Mohammad-Nourizad.jpg
Kahrizak is a detention centre which was closed down last summer by the direct order of Ayatollah Khamenei and later confirmed that post-election detainees at this centre were tortured, abused and killed.

Nourizad, who is currently being held at Evin Prison, has written the letter at the behest of the Prosecutor-General. The letter indicates that Tehran Prosecutor-General, Abbas Jafari Dowlatabadi visited Nourizad and urged him to write a letter of apology to the Supreme Leader.

He writes: "At Evin Prison, I have been subjected to insults and beatings by illiterate interrogators."

He adds that interrogators "use the ugliest methods to extract their confessions from the accused," and goes on to say: "I really would have liked to introduce the second Kahrizak to you, if you could visit this place in person, and tell you of the disastrous behaviour of people who claim to be the soldiers of the Hidden Imam."
http://payvand.com/news/10/may/Iran-Green-artwork-thought-police.jpg
Mohammad Nourizad was arrested in the course of post-election protests to the alleged electoral fraud that gave Mahmoud Ahmadinejad another term at the presidency. He published three letters addressed to the Supreme Leader in critique of the violent confrontation of election protesters and was arrested in December for the charge of insulting the Leader and the Head of the Judiciary.

The preliminary court has sentenced Nourizad to three and a half years in prison and fifty lashes.

Nourizad started a hunger strike last week and on the third day of his strike, Tehran's Prosecutor-General visited him in person.

In a note that was published today on Kaleme website, Nourizad describes the details of that visit and Prosecutor-General's demand for a letter of apology for the Supreme Leader.

According to Nourizad's note, he tells the Prosecutor-General: "I will not ask for a pardon because I believe I have not committed any error."

The detained writer criticizes the lawlessness of the Islamic Republic judiciary which Nourizad claims "has no relation to Islam."

The filmmaker also adds that most of the Islamic Republic official bodies are "corrupt" and advises Tehran Prosecutor to resign from his position, as according to him, "Justice in our judicial system is a big joke."
Related Articles:


Iran Detained Journalist, Filmmaker Mohammad Nourizad Goes On Hunger Strike (http://www.payvand.com/news/10/may/1215.html)
Iran: Students Condemn Arrest Of Filmmakers Panahi, Nourizad (http://www.payvand.com/news/10/apr/1186.html)
Nourizad Writes His Forth Letter To The Supreme Leader From Evin Prison (http://www.payvand.com/news/10/apr/1212.html)
Prominent Iranian filmmaker Sentenced To Prison (http://www.payvand.com/news/10/apr/1171.html)

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Amnesty International report 2010 on Iran


http://firstpage.payvand.netdna-cdn.com/blog/files/2010/05/Amnesty-Internationa-1l-i.jpgNo one should be above the law. But all too often, those who commit the worst kinds of human rights abuses are not brought to justice.
Iran’s government continued to clamp down on all forms of dissent in the wake of the mass demonstrations following the disputed June 2009 presidential elections. The authorities deployed the paramilitary Basij and other security forces to prevent protestors gathering, arrested hundreds more political activists, journalists, students and women’s and human rights defenders, and continued to mount grossly unfair “show trials” resulting in long prison terms and, in a few cases, death sentences.

Two men were executed in January in connection with the protests.
The authorities also took severe measures against ethnic minority activists, such as members of the Kurdish minority, whom they often accused of engaging in armed opposition to the state – in several cases, such accused were executed after grossly unfair trials, as the Iranian authorities maintained their record of being one of the top executors in the world, and of executing juvenile offenders.
The Iranian authorities rejected out of hand many key recommendations made by other states to improve respect for human rights in the country, as part of the Universal Periodic Review of Iran by the UN Human Rights Council in February.
http://firstpage.payvand.netdna-cdn.com/blog/files/2010/05/Azadi-square-june-15-2009.jpgAzadi (freedom) Square June 15 2009

Background
International tension persisted over Iran’s nuclear enrichment programme. In March the UN Security Council voted to extend economic and political sanctions. In September, the government revealed the existence of a hitherto unknown enrichment facility.
Iran continued to host almost 1 million refugees, mostly from Afghanistan. They had limited access to social services and education.

Presidential election – widespread abuses
The authorities intensified their crackdown on critics and opponents of the government in the months preceding the 12 June presidential election, in which the incumbent, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was officially declared the winner. Only three of the 474 other applicants were permitted to stand. Mass protests broke out in response to the official result, declared on 13 June, with hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets. Security forces, notably the paramilitary Basij, were deployed to suppress the protests by force, particularly after the Supreme Leader ordered an end to demonstrations on 19 June. However, protests continued to the end of the year on significant days such as the religious festival of Ashoura on 27 December.
The authorities disrupted mobile phone and internet communications, including social networking sites, to prevent information circulating. They prevented foreign journalists from covering demonstrations, expelling some, and security officials controlled the content of newspapers. Security forces raided university campuses, injuring students. The authorities accused the US and UK governments of organizing the unrest, which those governments denied.
All three defeated candidates alleged election fraud and complained to the body responsible for administering the election. It carried out a partial re-count but largely rejected the candidates’ complaints. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was sworn in for a second term on 5 August.
Unlawful killings
The Basij and other security forces used excessive force against demonstrators, beating them with batons and riding motorcycles into them to cause injury. The authorities said 43 died in the protests but opposition sources said the true total was likely to be over 100. Hundreds were injured.
Neda Agha Soltan, aged 27, was shot dead in a Tehran street on 20 June during a demonstration. Her dying moments were filmed. The perpetrator was identified as a member of the Basij but the authorities claimed that British and US news media had caused her death. Neda Agha Soltan’s family and other mourners were harassed and intimidated by security officials when commemorating her life.
http://firstpage.payvand.netdna-cdn.com/blog/files/2010/05/Amnesty-Internationa-report-2010-iran.jpgAmnesty International report 2010 on Iran

Arrests and detentions
Well over 5,000 people were detained after the election by the end of the year, including opposition politicians, journalists, academics, students, lawyers, human rights activists and army officers. Those with dual nationality or links to the USA or UK were also targeted. Some were arrested at demonstrations; others at their home or workplace; and some, who were injured, from hospital. Most, if not all, were denied access to legal representation. Many were denied access to their families and to medical care. Hundreds of those arrested were freed within days or weeks, but scores were charged with vaguely worded offences, such as fomenting a “velvet revolution” or committing “acts against national security”, and prosecuted in “show trials”.
Mohammad Ali Abtahi, Mohsen Aminzadeh, Said Hajjarian and at least four other political leaders were detained days after the election. All were prisoners of conscience. Said Hajjarian was released on bail in October and Mohammad Ali Abtahi in November. Mohsen Aminzadeh remained in custody at the end of the year.
Rape and other torture
Some detainees were taken to the Kahrizak detention centre, south of Tehran, where they were tortured and otherwise ill-treated. Kahrizak quickly became so notorious for abuse that the Supreme Leader ordered its closure in July. By the end of the year, 12 officials were facing trial before a military court for abuses including three for murder.
Compelling evidence emerged that a number of detainees, both women and men, had been raped and otherwise tortured in detention, but instead of investigating allegations thoroughly, the authorities were quick to deny them and then harassed the victims and closed the offices of a committee collecting victims’ testimonies.
Ebrahim Sharifi, a student aged 24, testified that security officials raped him, beat him severely and subjected him to mock execution in the week following his arrest on 22 June. He tried to file a judicial complaint but went into hiding after he and his family were threatened by security officials. On 13 September a judicial panel dismissed his allegation of rape and accused him of fabricating it for political reasons and he fled Iran.
Mohsen Ruholamini, the son of an aide to presidential candidate Mohsen Rezaei, died on 23 July after about two weeks in Kahrizak. A coroner’s report found he had suffered a heart attack and internal bleeding and had been hit repeatedly with a hard
object.
Unfair trials
Mass “show trials” involving scores of detainees were staged in successive sessions beginning in August. The trials were grossly unfair. Most, if not all, defendants were denied access to lawyers. Most had been detained incommunicado for several weeks and many were reported to have been tortured or otherwise ill-treated before being brought to court.
The trials were closed but excerpts broadcast on state television showed defendants making what appeared to be coerced “confessions”. More than 80 were convicted and sentenced to prison terms of up to 15 years; at least six others were sentenced to death.
Human rights defenders
Human rights defenders, including minority and women’s rights activists, lawyers and trade unionists, continued to face arbitrary arrest, harassment, prosecution and unfair trials throughout the year. Some were banned from travelling abroad.
In April, five leaders of the Haft Tapeh Sugar Cane Company Trade Union were sentenced to up to six months’ imprisonment for “propaganda against the system” for criticizing conditions at their workplace when they were interviewed by foreign journalists in 2008. They began serving their sentences in November after they were upheld on appeal.
Five members of the Committee of Human Rights Reporters were arrested in December and others were sought by intelligence officials.
Discrimination against women
Women continued to face discrimination in law, despite some minor improvements. Women’s rights campaigners, including those active in the “One Million Signatures” campaign to end legal discrimination, were harassed, detained, prosecuted and banned from travelling for collecting signatures in support of their petition.
On 1 February, Alieh Eghdam-Doust, a member of the Campaign for Equality, began a three-year prison sentence imposed for participating in a peaceful demonstration. She was among many women arrested during a protest in June 2006 against discriminatory laws, and the first to begin serving a prison sentence.
Freedom of expression and association
The authorities blocked websites voicing criticism, notably those of Iranian bloggers, and periodically blocked those of foreign news media reporting on Iran. In April, they warned SMS users that messages were “controlled” by a new “internet crimes” law introduced in January. They also shut down or maintained bans on tens of journals, magazines and other print media, targeted critical journalists and infiltrated and undermined independent civil society groups, such as the Society of Esfahan Human Rights Supporters. Hundreds of students faced education bans for campus activism.
Four students at Tehran’s Amir Kabir University were arrested at their homes on 24 February for participating in a peaceful demonstration the previous day against the government’s decision to bury soldiers’ remains on the campus, and so facilitate unrestricted access to the campus by the Basij and other security forces. Other students were also arrested; all had been released uncharged by July.
Roxana Saberi, a journalist with joint US-Iranian nationality, was convicted of “collaborating with a hostile state” in a closed trial before Tehran’s Revolutionary Court on 18 April following her arrest on 31 January. She was sentenced to eight years in prison, but this was reduced to a suspended two-year term following local and international criticism. She was released on 12 May and allowed to leave the country.
Two brothers, Arash and Kamiar Alaei, both medical doctors active in the field of HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention, were sentenced in January to six and three years’ imprisonment respectively for “co-operating with an enemy government”. They had been tried before a closed court on 31 December 2008. They were neither told the charges or evidence against them nor permitted by the court to call or examine witnesses. Both men were prisoners of conscience, imprisoned on account of their medical work with US and other international medical institutions.
Discrimination, Ethnic minorities
Members of Iran’s ethnic minorities continued to face discrimination along with harassment and imprisonment for advocating greater respect for social and cultural rights, including the right to mother tongue education. In June, the government announced that it would allow some higher education in regional languages.
Members of the Ahwazi Arab and Azerbaijani minorities were subject to continuing repression. Members of the small Sunni Azerbaijani minority were arrested in February when they protested against cuts in water supplies. Members of the Kurdish minority suspected of belonging to banned armed opposition groups were arrested and imprisoned. Some were sentenced to death and at least one was executed, possibly in reprisal for a spate of attacks on officials in Kordestan province in September. In Sistan- Baluchistan province, home to the mostly Sunni Muslim Baluch minority, violence intensified amid increasing clashes between the security forces and members of the People’s Resistance Movement of Iran (PRMI), an armed political group also known as Jondallah. On 18 October, at least 42 people, including senior Revolutionary Guards officers and civilians, were killed in an attack claimed by the PRMI.
On 30 May, two days after a PRMI bomb attack on a mosque in Zahedan killed at least 25 people, three men were publicly executed near the mosque for allegedly smuggling the explosives into Iran; all three had been in prison accused of other bombings when the attack happened.

Religious minorities
Members of religious minorities, including some not recognized by the government, continued to suffer discrimination, harassment, arbitrary arrest and damage to community property. Among those targeted were Sunni Muslim clerics; Shi’a clerics advocating the separation of the state from religion; members of the Dervish and Ahl-e Haqq communities; members of a philosophical association called Al-e Yasin; Christians; and members of the Baha’i community, who remained unable to access higher education. Converts from Islam were at risk of attack as well as prosecution for “apostasy”, which is punishable by death.
Maryam Rostampour and Marzieh Amirizadeh Esmaeilabad, both Christian converts, were arrested on 5 March in Tehran for handing out Bibles and participating in religious gatherings. Both were prisoners of conscience. Released in November after acquittal in October of “acting against state security” by a Revolutionary Court, they continued to face charges of “apostasy” and “proselytizing” in a General Court.
Seven Baha’is, two women and five men, who were arrested in March and May 2008, remained held without trial in Evin Prison in Tehran. All faced charges of spying for Israel and “insulting religious sanctities and propaganda against the system”. In May their families were told that they had also been charged with “corruption on earth”, which can be punished by death.
Torture and other ill-treatment
Torture and other ill-treatment in pre-trial detention remained common, facilitated by the routine denial of access to lawyers by detainees and impunity for officials who perpetrate violations. Methods reported included severe beatings; confinement in tiny spaces; deprivation of light, food and water; and systematic denial of medical treatment. At least 12 people were believed to have died in custody in 2009 apparently as a result of ill-treatment or lack of adequate medical care. No investigations into any torture allegations were reported, except at Kahrizak.
Cruel, inhuman and degrading punishments
Sentences of flogging and judicial amputation were imposed and carried out. In February, the Supreme Court upheld a sentence in which acid would be dropped into the eyes of a man who had blinded a woman with the same liquid.
Death penalty
Iran maintained one of the highest rates of execution globally. At least 388 people were executed, including one man who was stoned to death and at least five juvenile offenders sentenced for crimes committed when they were aged under 18. At least 14 were executed in public. The actual totals were believed to be higher.
The rate of reported executions rose sharply during the unrest between the presidential election on 12 June and the inauguration on 5 August – 112 executions were recorded, an average of more than two a day.
The authorities carried out mass executions in January, March, July and August, during which a total of 77 people were executed. At least 11 people sentenced to die by stoning and at least 136 juvenile offenders remained on death row
at the end of the year.
Delara Darabi, a 22-year-old woman convicted of a crime she allegedly committed when aged 17, was executed on 1 May despite a two-month stay ordered by the Head of the Judiciary.
Amnesty International visits/reports
The authorities continued to deny access to Amnesty International. The organization has not been permitted to visit the country to research human rights since shortly after the Iranian Revolution in 1979.
- Iran: Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review (MDE 13/009/2009)
- Human rights in the spotlight on the 30th anniversary of the Islamic revolution (MDE 13/010/2009)
- Iran: Election amid repression of dissent and unrest (MDE 13/053/2009)
- Iran: Election contested, repression compounded (MDE 13/123/2009)


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Iranian filmmakers criticize Culture Ministry for new censorship rules (http://www.payvand.com/news/10/may/1323.html) - Three Iranian documentary filmmakers criticized the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance for its plan to establish a council to exercise control over the foreign premiere of Iranian short and documentary films. -MNA 5/30/10


Jailed Student Activist Breaks His Hunger Strike (http://www.payvand.com/news/10/may/1320.html) - Jailed student Majid Tavakoli has broken his hunger strike and been transferred to the general ward of Tehran's Evin prison, according to his brother, Ali Tavakoli. 5/30/10