Very few noticed or condemned the brutal execution of Kurdish political prisoner Sabir Moklid Moane by the Islamic Republic of Iran on January 6, 2015 in a prison in Urmiye. According to Kurdish Human Rights activists Mr. Moane “was executed at dawn” on the familiar charges of “enmity against God and undermining national security”.
This execution was not unprecedented as the Islamic Republic greeted the New Year with chronicles of new executions. Moane was arrested in early summer of 2013, charged with membership in an unnamed political party. In November 2014 he had joined a hunger strike in Urmiye prison, objecting to mixing of convicts and abusive offenders with political prisoners, who were being subjected to physical and psychological torture and abuse.
Reportedly among hundreds of Kurdish prisoners there are at least 25 others whose executions are imminent. These prisoners will suffer the same fate if the international community does not take action promptly. The punishment for ethnic and religious minorities has been found to be even more draconian. As pointed out by Dr. Shaheed, the Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Iran, “Members of ethnic-minority groups, in particular those espousing ethno-cultural, linguistic or minority religious rights, appear to be disproportionately charged with moharebeh[ enmity against God] and mofsedfel-arz [ decadent of earth], sometimes seemingly for exercising their rights to peaceful expression.”
The UN Secretary-General in March 2014, revealed his dismay at the abysmal condition of human rights in Iran when he implicated Hassan Rouhani, the president of Iran for “the sharp rise in executions and continued “application of the death penalty….”.
Dr. Shaheed’s report in the October of 2014 gave as gruesome and gloomy an image as that of the Secretary General’s. Dr. Shaheed had noted “Between July 2013 and June 2014, at least 852 individuals were reportedly executed representing an alarming increase in the number of executions in relation to the already-high rates of previous years.”
The international Community on November 18, in its Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian, and Cultural) once again highlighted the gravity of troubling human rights in the country with no signs of improvement. Those troubling reports of 2014 are now recurring in 2015 as reconfirmed by the execution of Mr. Moane and the imminent threat of other executions.
Those who were harboring naïve optimism about an unfolding reform under Rouhani, have to struggle to show any genuine reforms or any semblance of liberalization during his presidency.
Members of religious and ethnic minorities are still brutally persecuted and any freedom of expression is squelched. The Western apologists in their nervous quest for a nuclear deal with Iran may show greater reservations about continuing flagrant violations of human rights in Iran, patterns that were disturbingly prevalent in 1980s and 1990s. Unfortunately, Western approach to human rights in Iran, in general, and Kurdish human rights in particular will continue to be driven by national interests and international relations.
In the face of these challenges, human rights activists and non-governmental agencies, the Special Rapporteur on Iran, and UN Secretary General should vigorously pursue their critical scrutiny of human rights violations in Iran and exert increasing pressure on the regime to halt the executions of political prisoners. The international community undeniably has an obligation to condemn the execution of the Kurdish prisoner Mr. Moane to protect other political prisoners and human right activists from brutal persecutions.
As recently proven, the Islamic Republic does show at least ostensible sensitivity to how it is being viewed in the West. Increasing pressure should be exerted so that the regime in Tehran is forced to cooperate with human rights agencies and is held accountable for its atrocious violations of human rights.
Dr. Amir Sharifi, President of the Kurdish American Education Society-Iran in California
