Baku /24.10.19 / Turan: Azerbaijani Turks, Arabs, Kurds, as well as representatives of other ethnic and religious minorities in Iran are subjected to repression, and persecution. Poverty and unemployment are increasing in the country, which is partly a result of the reintroduction of economic sanctions in November 2018, stated the Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran, Jaweed Rehman.
"Representatives of national minorities face discrimination, especially in the field of employment and education," said a UN expert. They are also subjected to political harassment, repression and serious human rights violations.
Representatives of ethnic and religious minorities are very numerous among those sentenced to death on charges brought by security services, as well as among political prisoners.
“I am concerned about the hatred of minorities and the fact that national legislation does not provide adequate protection against discrimination,” the speaker said at a press conference and said that he had presented an extensive report on Iran to the delegates of the Third Committee of the UN General Assembly.
The report noted that Iran has at least 15 million Azerbaijani Turks. At least 82 people from this community were sentenced to six years on charges of threatening national security. Among them, fans of the Tiraktur football club of East Azerbaijan. They were arrested and detained for chanting pro-Azerbaijani slogans during a match on May 2, 2019 at the Sekhend stadium in Tabriz.
The report also talks about intimidation of human rights defenders, journalists and women protesting against the mandatory wearing of the hijab.
Jaweed Rehman expressed concern over a number of other human rights violations in Iran, including condemning the use of the death penalty. Only this year in Iran, death sentences were carried out in respect of 173 people. Two of them are minors.
UN Special Rapporteurs are independent experts appointed by the Human Rights Council and authorized to prepare reports on the human rights situation in a particular country. -02D-
Politics
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