Human rights

CHRI – One of the few remaining defense lawyers in Iran willing to take on human rights cases, Nasser Zarafshan is an expert at navigating the Islamic Republic’s judicial system, which criminalizes dissent and imprisons lawyers like Zarafshan for doing their job. Usually tried under trumped-up “national security” charges, his cases often involve individuals who’ve been targeted by the state’s sprawling security establishment …

Al-Monitor – Iran is deporting thousands of Afghan refugees who fled the Taliban, including more than 28,000 in the last week of October, the UN’s migration agency said.   The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said Thursday that Iranian and Pakistani authorities have sent back more than 1 million Afghan migrants this year, as others are still trying to escape the …

Al-Monitor – The British government says it urged Iran to release its detained citizens on Thursday, but the husband of British-Iranian charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe says his own meeting with the Foreign Office gave him “no hope.”   British officials on Thursday met in London with Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani to discuss the landmark nuclear deal ahead …

torontosun – The regime in Iran is up in arms. Last month, after the UN special rapporteur for human rights in Iran, Javaid Rehman, condemned Tehran’s domestic repression at the UN General Assembly, an Iranian diplomat had choice words for the West — and for Canada in particular. “The appointment of a special rapporteur for Iran,” said Zahra Ershadi, Iran’s deputy ambassador …

Iranwire – Iranians held at a Ministry of Intelligence detention center after the November 2019 protests were given psychoactive drugs and shut in a room resembling a grave in a bid to make them “confess”, an insider has claimed. Speaking at the Aban Tribunal in London on Wednesday with his face and voice obscured, Witness 185 was introduced as a relative of a high-ranking …

VOA —Iran is facing renewed scrutiny for its deadly suppression of nationwide protests in 2019, as a London tribunal organized by rights groups began hearing testimony Wednesday from relatives of those killed and others regarding alleged crimes committed in the crackdown. The event known as an international people’s tribunal opened in London’s Church House conference center. Its goal is to investigate alleged …

Iran-HRM – The 2nd Branch of the Revolutionary and Public Court of Rudsar summoned the activist teacher Aziz Ghasemzadeh on November 6, 2021. The security forces had arrested Aziz Ghasemzadeh on September 26, 2021, one day after the nationwide protest gatherings of teachers in 36 cities. They subsequently inspected his residence and confiscated some of his personal belongings. The state security forces arrested …

Iran-HRM – Arbitrary shooting of Farhad Zandi by Iran security forces The State Security Forces shot at a car driving on Sanandaj-Dehgolan Road, killing Farhad Zandi, a Kurdish citizen, on November 7, 2021. The security forces were from the SSF Counter-smuggling department. They shot at the car without confirming if it contained smuggled goods. Despite Farhad’s car being clean in …

CHRI — Two years after Iran’s security forces violently crushed mass protests that erupted across the country, leaving hundreds of civilians killed, two officials who oversaw that repression and have committed egregious rights violations for decades—President Ebrahim Raisi and Judiciary Chief Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Eje’i—have risen to top positions of power in Iran. “Two years ago, Iranian men and women of all ages and classes risked …

amnesty – This document contains the details of 323 men, women and children documented by Amnesty International as having been killed by Iran’s security forces during their crackdown on mass protests that erupted across Iran between 15 and 19 November 2019, following the government’s announcement about the significant overnight rise in the price of fuel. Choose a language to view …