|
A.C.N - Aid to the Church in Need Italian Office |
Religious Freedom in
the Majority Islamic Countries |
|
Iran Population:
62,304,000
Heir to the tradition of the Persian empire, Iran has always maintained its own specific culture within the context of the Islamic world. The present order of the presidential Islamic Republic was enacted in 1979 when the last Shah, Reza Pahlavi, was forced by popular pressure to abandon the country and the government was taken over by the Ayatollah Khomeini. The new state, organised on the basis of rigid Shiite principles, has established itself at the head of a vast international Islamic movement, promoting and financing in other countries the emergence of cultural centres, associations and militant groups. The United States have frequently launched the accusation that these supposedly cultural activities are often used as a smoke screen for concealing international terrorist actions, and the United States accuse Iran of arming, financing and training Islamic terrorist groups. From 1980 to 1988, Iran was engaged in a bloody war against the Iraq of Saddam Hussein. The Iraqi aggression, despite conspicuous aid on the part of some Western nations and the Soviet bloc, met with stubborn resistance from the Iranian army and finally, after nine years of war, there was a truce between the two countries. Since the death of Khomeini in 1989, Iran has gone through various stages in its relations with the West, at times remaining completely isolated, at times attempting openings and rapprochement. According to the group Iranian Christians International, an organisation devoted to the religious freedom of Iranian Christians, the persecution has reached its greatest intensity in recent years, despite the election as President of Mohamad Name in May 1997, who is considered a more moderate figure. The question of religious freedom Shiite Islam, which in Iran is the state religion, represents the religion of the vast majority of the inhabitants of the country. Nonetheless there do exist some minorities, such as the Christians of various denominations, the followers of Baha’i Islam, and the Jews. The establishment of an Islamic Republic very quickly lead to a series of grave difficulties and discrimination for the Christian community in Iran. Right from the start of 1979 the Catholic religious, especially the Salesian Fathers, began to come under attack in the Islamic press. The Imam Khomeini himself called for the immediate closure of the Catholic schools. On August 10 1979, all foreign priests and Catholic religious were given one month to leave the country. The archbishop of Tehran was quickly expelled, and only after difficult negotiations was the expulsion order somewhat mitigated. As to the Protestants and the Anglicans, they were immediately expelled. In June 1980 all the Catholic schools regarded as "foreign" were closed by the authorities. As Didier Rance has noted, the anti-Christian actions in Iran show two aspects, on the one hand there is discrimination, on the other the attempt to assimilate, carried out above all through the school education system and indoctrination during military service. The islamisation of the schools pervades every aspect of education; young Christians are obliged to study from texts steeped in Islamic propaganda that is defamatory and offensive towards the Christian religion. According to a report by the organisation Human Rights Without Frontiers, the government has tolerated the activities of the Orthodox Christians, who represent over 90 per cent of the Christian population of Iran (which is estimated at around 60,000 persons, of whom the Catholics represent about 12,000), although in their relations with Muslim society they suffer discrimination in their communities. The Protestant churches are subject to greater hostility on the part of the government, because of their privileged links with those Western nations who are most hostile to the Iranian regime, and also because they are more active in proselytism. The report of HRWF maintains that the persecution against the Protestants has intensified during the ’nineties, four of their leaders having been murdered - in circumstances that might well indicate government complicity (taken from Droits de l’homme sans frontières, March 13 1998). On February 2 1998, the Holy Father received the Iranian Foreign Minister in audience on a courtesy visit, in which they discussed peace in the Middle East. Despite the affinity between the Vatican and Tehran in certain moral questions, there have frequently been strained relations in the past owing to the different interpretations of the idea of religious liberty. In Iran in fact, Christians are barely tolerated. Conversion from Islam to Christianity can be punished even with death. There are numerous violations of human rights in Iran, from the death penalty to the torture of prisoners, to trials without due process, to assassinations and discrimination against the religious minorities. The application of the Sharia is particularly harsh, especially towards the Baha’i and the Christians. In theory Christianity is one of the few religious minorities tolerated under the Constitution, but in reality the Christian faithful are closely supervised and subjected to all kinds of obstacles. The religious institutes are invaded and individuals threatened. Out of fear many people change their usual places of prayer and worship. If their meetings are discovered by the police the participants are subjected to torture. Whereas the regime itself makes no move towards greater respect of human rights or harmonious co-existence between the various religions, the representatives of the Church are always seeking new ways of finding rapprochement and dialogue. According to the press agency Droits de l'homme sans frontières of October 2 1998, three members of the Baha’i - imprisoned at Mashhad since October 1997 on charges of "having continued to hold meetings on family life" - have recently learned, quite casually from the prison director, that they had been condemned to death. According to the same source of October 15, there are reasons for believing that this sentence has already been carried out. The three condemned men are Atah’ullah Hamid Nazirizadih, Sirus Dhabihi-Muqahaddam and Hidayat-Kashifi Najafabadi. Like all the Baha’i they are considered heretics and do not have the right to practise their own religion, even though it is a pacific one and respectful of authority. On July 21 another Baha’i, Ruhu’llah Rawhani, aged 52 and father of four children, was imprisoned in the same prison for having converted a woman to his own faith, even though the woman herself protested that she had been brought up in the Baha’i religion by her own family. During the summary trial there was no lawyer to represent Rawhani, nor was any formal sentence given. The German daily Die Tageszeitung of December 18 1996 notes that in theory the Christian, Jewish and Zoroastrian minorities are recognised by the constitution; two seats in parliament are guaranteed for the Armenian and Syrian Christians and one each for the Jews and the Zoroastrians. Churches, temples and synagogues are financed by the State. Within their walls the Islamic laws do not apply, women can be without the chaddar, and the Armenians are permitted to use wine for the Mass. But these constitutionally guaranteed rights do not always protect them from persecution. The humanitarian agencies are continually denouncing acts of persecution, above all against those who have converted from Islam to Christianity. The principal victims of these persecutions are the Baha’i. It appears that in the course of the revolution some 200 of them were killed. Many are in prison and two have been sentenced to death. This minority group is not permitted to hold state employment and the young Baha’i are not allowed to enrol at university, because for Islam their religion is an illegal one. However, their persecution goes back more than a century and a half, and there is thought to be a plan to eradicate their communities, which number 300,000 members and make up the largest single minority in the country. Some aspects of this plan can be inferred from a document, dating back to 1991, produced by the Supreme Cultural Council of the Revolution and signed by Ayatollah Ali Khameni, in which it is stated that within the country the adherents of this religion must be denied access to all employment and positions of influence and that the cultural roots of the Baha’i must be destroyed, even abroad. According to the humanitarian organisation Human Rights Watch, the hostility thus shown against the followers of the Baha’i is an indication of a thoroughgoing persecution of this community, which has been forbidden any kind of religious activity and likewise been denied de facto even the freedom of scholastic education, through the closure of the Baha’i Institute for Higher Education in September 1998. Since 1979, over 200 adherents of this religion have been killed, while another 15 have disappeared and are presumed dead. Since 1993 gatherings of the Baha’i faithful have been banned, and merely participating in their activities - even in private homes - can have grave consequences. During the last three years, over 200 Baha’i have been arrested and held in prison, for periods varying from 48 hours to six months, in the towns of Yazd Isfahan, Simnan, Babul, Kirmanshah, Mashhad, Shiraz, Tankabun, Ahvaz, Kirman, Karaj, Qa’im Shahr and Tehran. Since November 1997, 12 Baha’i have been arrested and six have been subsequently released. The release of Kamyar Ruhi in May 1998, following his imprisonment since February 1996, and the recent execution of Ruhu’llah Rahwani bring the total number of Baha’i in prison for reasons of their religious faith to 15 - assuming that the three condemned men mentioned above have not already been executed. Their names (with date of arrest, charges levelled and sentence given) are as follows: Bihnam Mithaqi (29.4.1989; Baha’i zionist activities; death), Kayvan Khalajabadi (29.4.1989; Baha'i Zionist activities; death), Musa Talibi (7.6.1994; proselytism, apostasy; death), Dhabihubullah Mahrami (6.9.1995; apostasy; death), Mansur Haddadan (29.2.1996; organising an exhibition of children’s art; 3 years), Arman Damishqi Kurush Dhabihi (early 1996; bad behaviour, refusal to give evidence; 8 years), Jaml Hajipur (19.5.1997; espionage, organisation of meetings for young people; 2 years), Mansur Mehrabi (or Mihrabkani) (19.5.1997; espionage, organisation of meetings for young people; 2 years), Nasir Qadiri (5.11.1997; participating in "family meetings"; 3 years), Atah’ullah Hamid Nazirizadih, Sirus Dhabihi-Muqhaddam and Hidayat Kashifi Najafabadi (October - November 1997; participating in "family meetings"; death), Sonia Ahmadi, Manuchehr Ziyai (1.5.1998; organising youth meetings; 3 years). Finally, the Italian newspapers reported on October 11 last year that the death sentence against Helmut Hofer, a German citizen aged 56, charged with having had a relationship with a Muslim woman of 27, had been confirmed on appeal. The woman herself had been condemned to 99 lashes. The Islamic law envisages the possibility of the death sentence for anyone found guilty of "illegitimate relations with a Muslim woman". Hofer, however, maintains that he had converted to Islam many years ago when he married a Turkish woman and was willing to marry the Iranian girl who was the subject of the charge. |
|