Subject: [fem-women2000 563] Iranian Women's Brief #33, Please Read and Pass on
From: AIWUSA <aiwusa@aiwusa.org>
Date: Thu, 07 Dec 2000 15:45:07 -0500
Seq: 563
AIWUSA-ASSOCIATION OF IRANIAN WOMEN-USA WEBSITE: http://www.aiwusa.org/ E-mail: aiwusa@aiwusa.org TEL: 703-941-8485 CONTACT PERSON: BEHJAT DEHGHAN IRANIAN WOMEN BRIEF (IWB) #33 DECEMBER 2000 -U.N. GENERAL ASSEMBLY RAPS IRAN ON RIGHTS ABUSES, REUTERS, DECEMBER 4 -NCR'S PRESIDENT: HALT IN RIGHTS ABUSE ONLY WITH MULLAHS' OVERTHROW, IRAN ZAMIN NEWS AGENCY, DECEMBER 4 -GUARDIAN COUNCIL VETO BID TO CUT TEENAGE MARRIAGES, REUTERS, NOVEMBER 11 -THE TEENAGE RUNAWAYS OF TEHRAN, THE INDEPENDENT, NOVEMBER 13 -HONOR KILLING, AFP, NOVEMBER 18 -85% OF SUICIDE VICTIMS WOMEN -SPECIAL SUBWAY CARES FOR WOMEN -GIRLS NEED PARENTAL CONSENT TO LEAVE COUNTRY -IRANIAN WOMEN FORCED TO WEAR THE VEIL IN GERMANY U.N. GENERAL ASSEMBLY RAPS IRAN ON RIGHTS ABUSES, REUTERS, DECEMBER 4 UNITED NATIONS - Rebuking Iran on a series of human rights abuses, the U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution on Monday calling to Tehran to end torture, particularly amputations. The resolution chastised Iran for executions, a rackdown on freedom of speech and press, and discrimination against religious minorities, such as the Bahais. The resolution called on the Iranian government "to take all necessary steps to end the use of torture and other forms of cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment, in particular the practice of amputation." It expressed concern about "the deterioration of the situation with regard to freedom of opinion and expression, in particular at restrictions on the freedom of the press." The resolution also criticized the judiciary for suspending newspapers and arresting journalists, political activists and intellectuals in the interests of national security, which the General Assembly called "a pretext to deny or restrict freedom of expression, opinion and thought." The document was based on a report from Canadian jurist Maurice Copithorne on developments in the first six months of this year. He found executions continued at a high rate. "That torture continues in the Islamic Republic of Iran and in its most primitive form -- was confirmed in the period under review," said Copithorne, who has not been allow into Iran since 1996. "Eleven executions were held in public. In three other cases, individuals sentenced to death were pardoned from execution by the family of the victim at the execution site," Copithorne said in the report. ********************************************************* NCR'S PRESIDENT: HALT IN RIGHTS ABUSE ONLY WITH MULLAHS' OVERTHROW, IRAN ZAMIN NEWS AGENCY, DECEMBER 4 Subsequent to the United Nations General Assembly's resolution condemning the violations of rights in Iran, Mr. Massoud Rajavi, President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, said: "The document, the forty-seventh resolution by the U.N. General Assembly and the Human Rights Commission censuring mullahs' rights abuses, is a clear international acknowledgment of the reality that three-and-a-half years after Khatami took office, there has been no improvement in the situation of human rights in Iran and that any reform in the ruling regime is but a mirage." ********************************************************* GUARDIAN COUNCIL VETO BID TO CUT TEENAGE MARRIAGES, REUTERS, NOVEMBER 11 TEHRAN - Iran's Guardian Council has quashed a parliamentary attempt to cut the number of teenage marriages, ruling such a move would break Islamic law, Hambastegi newspaper said on Saturday. MPs voted last month to make it compulsory for girls under the age of 15 and boys under 18 to have court approval to get married. Currently Iran's law sets the minimum marriage age at nine for girls and 14 for boys. THE TEENAGE RUNAWAYS OF TEHRAN, THE INDEPENDENT, NOVEMBER 13 ... Each day, an average of 45 Iranian girls run away >from home, fugitives from poverty, cruelty and social imprisonment. Too often, the fate that awaits them is worse than the misery they left behind. The pattern is well known, especially to police, social workers and the gangland dons. If they are from small-town Iran, the fugitives often get on the first train to Tehran. "When these provincial girls reach the capital," says Dr. Shokouh Navabinejad, a psychologist, "it's a question of who gets to them first - the police or the gangs." Girls picked up by the police are passed on to state welfare organizations. Others, tempted by promises of money and legal employment, drift into crime and the sex trade. Some simply disappear. Of the 30 women raped and killed in Tehran in the first six months of this year, most are believed to have been runaways.... ... In the third decade of the Islamic regime set up after the 1979 revolution, young Iranians are being tugged in different directions - towards greater religiosity by ruling clerics, towards globalization by increasing contact with Western culture, towards social dislocation by a stagnant economy. All of which may explain why teenage suicide is a rising scourge.... ********************************************************* "Honor killings" AFP, November 18 - A young woman suspected of "loose morals" was beaten and then burned alive by her father and brother, press reports said. The pair tied her down, beat her and then immolated her at the family home in the western city of Kermanshah because they suspected her of corruption and loose morals, the Hambastegi paper said. She died before friends and neighbours could save her. ********************************************************* 85% of suicide victims women November 8: In a gathering of managers and instructors of the four districts of Ahwaz, Shahla Boroujerdi, deputy Interior Minister for women's affairs, said 85% of persons who commit suicide by setting fire to themselves are women. 89% of these women are housewives.. ********************************************************* Special subway cars for women Jomhouri Islami, October 30 - The managing director of Tehran's subway said: Tehran's Metro Company has allocated special cars to women. Mohammad Reza Barari said: Those women who are traveling with male members of their own family may use the other cars as well. ********************************************************* Girls need parental consent to leave country IRNA, October 28: Female University students who want to leave the country to continue their education, need their father or foster parent's permission. The decision was announced by the Education and Research Committee of the Majlis. ********************************************************* Iranian women forced to wear the veil in Germany Voice of America, November 21 - Two Iranian women filed a complaint with German judicial authorities against agents of the Immigration Service who forced them to wear the head scarf and take pictures needed for deportation papers. The highest court in Germany will examine this case. The Supreme Court in the city of Karlsruhe is examining this case to find out whether the religious rights of this 36-year-old woman and her 14-year-old daughter were violated in Nurnberg. By forcing these two women to take pictures as required by officials of the Islamic Republic, the agents of the Immigration Service wanted to facilitate the deportation of these women to Iran. The Iranian authorities would not allow the women to enter the country if their passport photos were taken without the headscarves. The lawyers of the two Iranians said forcing the women to wear the veil was a violation of their religious rights. The Court of Karlsruhe will announce its decision in several weeks. _________________________________________________________________________ fem-Women2000@jca.apc.org for Women 2000, UN Special Session on Beijing+5 Searcheable Archive http://www.jca.apc.org/fem/news/women2000/index.shtml visit fem-net HomePage for other mailing lists http://www.jca.apc.org/fem