The Australian Baha’i community has expressed its alarm about the arrests in Iran yesterday of six key Baha’is who coordinate the activities of the Baha’i community in that country.
The arrests are yet another indication of the Iranian government's determination to extinguish the 300,000 strong Baha'i community there, said a spokesperson for the Australian Baha’i Community, Natalie Mobini-Kesheh.
Dr Mobini-Kesheh said officers of the Intelligence Ministry arrested the Baha’is after conducting extensive searches of their homes in early morning raids on 14 May 2008.
The officers then took the Baha’is to the notorious Evin prison in Tehran. The seventh member of the group has been in prison in Mashhad since she was arrested on 5 March 2008.
“We are extremely concerned because such sweeping arrests of key Baha’i figures in Iran have not occurred since the terrible events of the early 1980s,” Dr Mobini-Kesheh said.
Abductions and executions
On 21 August 1980 all nine members of the national Baha’i administrative council in Iran were abducted and disappeared without a trace.
On 27 December 1981 eight of the nine members of a reconstituted council were executed by the authorities.
Dr Mobini-Kesheh said the Baha’i community of Iran was a demonstrably peace-loving, law abiding and non-violent community.
“The Baha’is are Iran’s biggest religious minority and have now been made more vulnerable through this wholly unwarranted action,” she said.
Those arrested are:
- Mrs Fariba Kamalabadi
- Mr Jamalu'd-Din Khanjani
- Mr 'Afif Na'imi
- Mr Sa'id Rida'i
- Mr Bihruz Tavakkuli
- Mr Vahid Tizfahm.
“The Australian Baha’i community today asked the Australian Government to take steps to protest against this sinister action of the Iranian authorities,” Dr Mobini-Kesheh said.
“We are very grateful to the Australian Government for its efforts in the past in defence of the human rights of the unjustly treated Baha’i community in Iran.”
Read the report from the Baha'i World News Service
Background information on the persecution of Baha'is in Iran
No comments:
Post a Comment