A bleak future for Baha'is

Moojan Momen

Published 13 May 2009

International pressure may have set Roxana Saberi free, but the plight of seven Iranian Baha'is, imprisoned in Tehran a year ago, has gone largely unnoticed.

Earlier this week, US-Iranian journalist Roxana Saberi was freed from prison in Iran after having her sentence for "spying" reduced. The charge, which she strongly denied, sparked international attention and calls for her release, which has now been widely welcomed.

But Ms Saberi leaves behind her many other inmates in Tehran's notorious Evin prison whose “crimes” against the Iranian state are also open to question.

Thursday (14 May) marks the first anniversary of the arrest and detention of seven prominent members of the Baha'i faith, Iran's largest non-Muslim religious minority.

The five men and two women made up an informal national committee, serving the needs of the country's 300,000 strong Baha'i community in the absence of formal Baha'i institutions, which are outlawed. Their committee – which had operated with the full knowledge of the authorities – along with all local ad hoc Baha'i administrations – was disbanded in March this year in a gesture of good will from the peaceful and law-abiding Baha'is to their government.

In the one year since their incarceration, the seven detainees have faced no charges nor have they been allowed access to their legal counsel, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Dr Shirin Ebadi. They have faced spurious accusations of "espionage for Israel", and "insulting religious sanctities".

Iran’s prosecutor-general, Ayatollah Dorri-Najafabadi, has asserted that there is evidence that the seven have been involved in "intelligence-gathering" and "infiltration", thus more or less declaring their guilt before any trial date has been announced. The evidence he refers to has yet to be disclosed to the public or produced in a court of law.

In recent days, however, a report from the Baha'i's UN office indicates that another charge is being levelled against the seven prisoners; that of “spreading corruption on earth.”

To the Western reader, such an accusation may seem to be a confusing or even nebulous basis for criminal charges. But in theocratic Iran it has a basis in the penal code and leaves the accused in an extremely vulnerable position.

The term, found in the Koran, has increasingly been used within Islamic legal practice to brand any undesirable "offender": Muslims considered to be too lax in their practices; those who are considered socially evil, such as drug-traffickers and prostitutes; or those with whom the authorities have a fundamental theological disagreement, such as the Baha’is.

Vague as these charges may be, they still have the potential to lead the accused to the executioner.

The allegations against the Baha'is are as nonsensical as they are unjust. The accusations play to the fears of certain areas of the Iranian population about enemies - internal and external - conspiring to undermine the country.

Iran remains a state with a great sense of its own historic legacy and with a clear goal of attaining a mantle of regional leadership - of both moral, as well as political, dimensions.

For the seven Baha'is being held in the grim confines of their Evin cells, their best hope for release might lie in a public protest as widespread as the one that led to the freeing of Roxana Saberi.

Such an outcry may help Iran’s leaders to reflect that imprisoning and persecuting the innocent is not in their national interest.

Moojan Momen is an Iranian author and academic, and a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society

SOURCE: http://www.newstatesman.com/international-politics/2009/05/roxana-saberi-baha-iran-tehran

By Jim Garamone

American Forces Press Service

Jan. 7, 2008 - Three U.S. Navy vessels took evasive actions after five Iranian boats buzzed the ships transiting the Straits of Hormuz yesterday, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said today.  Speaking to Pentagon reporters, Whitman called the Iranian provocation "a serious incident." The fast Iranian boats approached at "distances and speed that showed reckless, dangerous and potentially hostile intent," he said.

The incident lasted about 15 to 20 minutes, he said. The Navy ships were going into the Persian Gulf when the Iranian boats confronted them.

"Small, Iranian fast boats made some aggressive maneuvers against our vessels and indicated some hostile intent," Whitman said. "This required our vessels to issue warnings and conduct some evasive maneuvers. The U.S. Navy vessels were prepared to take appropriate actions, but there was no engagement of the vessels."

He said the speed of the Iranian boats and their distance from the U.S. Navy vessels demonstrated potentially hostile intent. Bridge-to-bridge radio communications between the Iranian vessels and the U.S. Navy ships reinforced this impression, he said.

The U.S. ships were operating in international waters within the Straits of Hormuz and followed all appropriate protocols, Whitman said. The ships are the USS Port Royal, USS Hopper and USS Ingraham. U.S. warships will take all the precautions needed to safely transit the open waters of the straits, the Pentagon spokesman said.

"This is reckless and dangerous behavior on the part of the Iranian vessels, and it should cease immediately," Whitman added.

Typically, small boats such as these are under command of Iranian Revolutionary Guards, U.S. Navy officials said.

All U.S. warships transiting the open seas are prepared to take action should their ship or crews be threatened, Whitman noted. The U.S. ships "did take appropriate action in terms of maneuvering and communicating, and were prepared to take further action if necessary," he said.

The Defense Department will work with White House and State Department officials to come up with the appropriate way to address the incident with the Iranian government, Whitman said.

Iranian boats took 15 British sailors engaged in United Nations-sanctioned operations in the northern Persian Gulf on March 23.

By Jim Garamone

American Forces Press Service

June 13, 2007 – The quantity of Iranian weapons being shipped to the Taliban in Afghanistan makes it unlikely that the Iranian government is not involved, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said today at Ramstein Air Base, Germany.  Gates also said he is concerned about the results of another attack on the Golden Mosque in Samara, Iraq.

"It would appear to be yet another effort by al Qaeda to try to prevent political reconciliation in Iraq, to try and stoke sectarian violence," he told reporters traveling with him.

Gates said he hopes the Iraqi people realize the attack was a transparent effort by the terrorist group to incite the sects and force more division between Sunni and Shiia Muslims. He expressed the hope the Iraqi people will realize this and refrain from violence.

A previous al Qaeda attack on the mosque on Feb. 22, 2006, ignited the sectarian violence that has plagued the country ever since. Sunni and Shiia death squads attacked each other following that attack. Today's attack destroyed two minarets on the grounds of the mosque.

Turning to the Iranian weapons being used in Afghanistan, Gates said they "run the gamut" from sophisticated explosively formed projectiles to basic ammunition.

"It's pretty clear there is a fairly substantial flow of weapons (into Afghanistan)," he said. "I haven't seen intelligence specifically to this effect, but I would say given the qualities we're seeing, it's difficult to believe it is associated with smuggling or the drug business or that it is taking place without the knowledge of the Iranian government."

The situation is ironic, given that the Afghan and Iranian governments have generally good relations, the secretary said.

"Whether Iran is trying to play both sides of the street, hedge their bets -- what their motives are other than causing trouble for us, I don't know," he said.

Today, Gates received briefings at U.S. European Command in Stuttgart, Germany, and visited wounded servicemembers at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center. He then will move to Brussels, Belgium, for NATO defense minister meetings.

Looking ahead, Gates said, he is prepared to discuss missile defense at the NATO meeting. He will examine the proposal put forth by Russian President Vladimir Putin to somehow combine the U.S. and Russian effort and have the European missile defense leg use radars in Azerbaijan. Putin made the proposal in talks with President Bush during the G-8 meetings in Germany last week.

"I'm pleased that President Putin acknowledged there is merit to missile defense," Gates said, "and that Iran does represent a problem that needs to be dealt with in terms of potential missile defense. I think there is a basis for having some good conversations."

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By John J. Kruzel

American Forces Press Service

June 6, 2007 – Coalition forces have the upper hand against Afghan insurgents despite previous fears of a bloody Taliban spring offensive aided by Iranian technology, the deputy director for operations on the Joint Staff said here today.  "I will tell you, I think in fact the offensive is not theirs but ours," Army Brig. Gen. Perry Wiggins told Pentagon reporters in a news conference.

Coalition troops have been highly active in Afghanistan's eastern and southern sectors, Wiggins said, and the Taliban's leadership and fighting force has suffered "serious losses."

Mullah Dadullah Lang, the Taliban's top military commander and "functional leader," was killed May 11 in the Ganstrah district of Helmand province, Wiggins announced during a May 16 operational briefing here.

"Dadullah Lang was responsible for the ethnic cleansing of the Hazaras in Bamyan province when the Taliban was in power. He was the lead proponent of suicide bombings and supervised dozens of Afghan beheadings. He was also behind the recent kidnappings of a Western journalist and French aid worker," said Wiggins, who described Lang's death as a "serious setback" for the enemy.

Today, the general expressed concern over insurgents' increasing use of complex asymmetric warfare tactics, including car and suicide bombings, and improvised explosive device and explosively formed penetrator attacks. EFPs are shaped charges designed to pierce armored vehicles.

"We're taking a look at a move toward a more asymmetric type of targeting or attacks through the use of IEDs," he said. "And a particular concern with the IEDs is the technology associated with these IEDs."

Wiggins said military officials believe technology involved in such bombing attacks is being imported from Iran. "We have seen some technology that tends us to believe that it's coming in from Iran. ... We know there's a flow," he said.

Iran also is exporting technology to insurgents in Iraq, Wiggins said, citing recent statements by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates. "Secretary Gates (talked) about the Iranian technology that seems to be flowing into Iraq. And the fact of the matter is, we need to stem that type of technology," he said.

In Iraq, attacks involving EFPs are occurring more frequently, Wiggins said.

"EFPs are a concern," he said. "We have seen a slight increase in that type of technology over the past several months."

During dialogues with Iranian diplomats, Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, addressed Iran's problematic exportation of weapons technology, the general said.

"One of the points that he brought up is we need to thwart the influx of this type of weapon systems coming into Iraq," Wiggins said. "The bottom line is actions speak louder than words with regard to these particular types of things."

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