Iran: An open letter from Shirin Ebadi on the arrests of activists in Iran

Due to the fact that lately women's rights in Iran have been more than ever endangered, hence a group of "women's rights defendants" have been sentenced to jail for periods of time.

I have taken the liberty and felt the need to inform you regarding some most important points, facts and details.

According to the constitutional law "clause No. 27" of the Islamic Republic of Iran, group gatherings and protest rallies without carrying any weapons, not being a disturbance to the Islamic Laws is called free and unleashed.

Hence on the 12th of June 2006, a group of women who were distressed about their discrimination status in Iran planned to gather in one of the squares in Tehran.

As soon as these women had gathered at the meeting point, yet before any speeches were held or any resolutions being read, this group of women were attacked by the police force.

This gathering of women was hence scattered and a number of women were even taken into custody for a few days.

While the attack was taking place, some of the women did get physically hurt. Fifteen of these women come to me and asked me to take and handle their cases in court, which I surely accepted and thus filed a case against the chief of police of Tehran and those who had actually taken part in this attack.

Unfortunately, the needed research from the opposite side on the files of these women has not been finished and our case against them, hence, has been set at a stand still and a halt.

Yet on the other hand, the attorney-general of Tehran, Mr. Saeed Mortazavi, has also filed a case against some of the participants in the above mentioned gathering which again I have accepted to work on their cases with the help of a few colleagues as well.

Unfavorably, after a short trial, the Islamic Revolutionary Court, by giving the argument that "for that rally no authorization had been given to those women from the ministry of the interior, hence this gathering and taking part in it was against the law and in the eyes of the law an act against the security of the country."

Those women who had been arrested, were hence sentenced to lashes and long-term imprisonment.

I will give you now the list of the names of these women and the sentences given to them:

1) Ms. Aliyeh Eghdam Dust / 3 years and 4 months in jail and 10 lashes

2) Ms. Delaram Ali / 2 years and 10 months in jail and 10 stokes of lashes

3) Ms. Fariba Davoudi Mohajer / 4 years in jail - which 3 years of it will be suspended for the duration of 5 years if she does not take part in any anti-discrimination actions in the future and if she does so she will have to face a jail sentence for a duration of one year. (Please note that this means that Ms. Davoudi Mohajer will never again have the right, a legal right to take any action against discrimination against women in Iran.)

4) Ms. Noushin Ahmady Khorasani / 3 years in jail - which 2 and 1/2 years of it will be suspended for the duration of five years if she does not take part in any anti-discrimination actions in the future and if she does so she will have to face a jail sentence for a duration of 6 months.( Which again means that she will have to give up her right to stand up for her idea against what is going on in Iran regarding women's rights.)

5) Ms. Parvin Ardalan / 3 years jail - which 2 and a 1/2 years of it will be suspended for the duration of 5 years if she does not take part in any anti-discrimination actions in the future and if she does so she will have to face a jail sentence of 6 months. (And again another case of women's discrimination)

6) Ms. Shahla Entezari / 3 years jail - which 2 and 1/2 years of it will be suspended for the duration of 5 years if she does not take part in any anti- discrimination actions in the future and if she does so she will have to face a jail sentence of 6 months. (Another violation regarding women's rights not letting women stand up against discriminating laws against women.)

7) Ms. Sussan Tahmasebi / 2 years jail - which 1 and 1/2 of it will be suspended for the duration of 5 years. (She is no longer going to be in the situation to take part in anti-discrimination actions, again against women's right in general and discrimination toward women as we saw in all the cases above.)

8) Ms. Azadeh Forghani / 2 years jail [...]

9) Ms. Bahareh Hedayad / 2 years jail [...]

Subsequently, regarding the actions taken by the police and the security forces towards the women on June 12th 2006, a written campaign was printed to be signed by one million women and men to show their thought and ideas regarding the discrimination between men and women within the law frame of Iran.

This campaign was also put on a web-site - www.we-change.org

Since this site was filtered by the Islamic Republic of Iran, a few students, young girls and boys, volunteered to collect signatures. Unfortunately the police and the security forces took action against them, again, and a few of these volunteers were taken into custody at a police station and a law case has been made against them as well which we are still waiting to get a trial date in this regard.

Surely you agree, that sentencing women to jail and lashes who are against men having the right to more than one wife, or that the blood-money for women is half of a man, or the fact that two women as a witness in the court of law count as one male witness, etc...not only is against the standards of human rights, it is also against moral principles.

All these people were asking for was to ban such discriminations in favor of women. To have this right to be equal as men in the society.

The painful point is that those sentenced above are not going to be the only ones charged in this law case. Some of my legal clients have not yet been given a court date since their files have not been set to motion and hence not active yet.

But I am sure that in the near future harsh sentences will face them as well.

Hence, I announce to you my deep concern regarding the fate of these fellow Iranians whose offence and crime is only their word against sexual discrimination.

Please send a delegate to Iran to inspect this situation regarding women's' rights in Iran, especially those who already have a criminal file and case.

If this note and report does prove itself correct which I assure you it will, needed steps should and can be taken to ban the aggression against these women.

Sincerely yours,

Shirin Ebadi
Nobel Prize Laureate, 2003
Attorney at Law