Subject: [fem-women2000 748] Iranian Women's Brief #46, Please Read and Pass on
From: AIWUSA <aiwusa@aiwusa.org>
Date: Mon, 03 Dec 2001 18:58:44 -0500
Seq: 748

AIWUSA-ASSOCIATION OF IRANIAN WOMEN-USA
WEBSITE: http://www.aiwusa.org
E-MAIL: aiwusa@aiwusa.org
TEL: 703-941-8584

CONTACT PERSON: BEHJAT DEHGHAN
IRANIAN WOMEN'S BRIEF NO.46
DECEMBER 2001

THE U.N RESOLUTION EXPRESSES CONCERN AT THE SYSTEMATIC
DISCRIMINATION AGAINST WOMEN AND GIRLS IN IRAN.

U.N. Committee OKs Iran Resolution
By EDITH M. LEDERER
.c The Associated Press

UNITED NATIONS (AP) - A key U.N. committee approved a
resolution Friday, November 30, expressing concern at
continuing human rights violations in Iran, including a
growing number of executions and crackdowns on freedom of
expression and freedom of the press.

The General Assembly's Social, Humanitarian and Cultural
Committee voted 71 to 53, with 41 abstentions, in favor
of the resolution calling on the Iran to abide by its
international human rights obligations.

The resolution received about 20 more ``yes'' votes than
a similar resolution last year, which Iranian opposition
groups attributed to the crackdown on human rights by
hard-liners in the government who believe in strict
adherence to the values of the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Approval by the committee means that the resolution is
certain to be adopted when it comes to a vote in the
189-member General Assembly in December.

The resolution ``expresses concern'' at the imprisonment
of journalists and members of Parliament, the harsh
reaction to student demonstrations, and the use of
torture and other forms of cruel and inhuman punishment,
``in particular the practice of amputation and the
growing number of cases of public flogging.'' It deplored
``public and especially cruel executions, such as
stoning.''

The resolution also expresses concern at the systematic
discrimination against women and girls, and against
minorities, especially Bahais, Christians, Jews and Sunni
Muslims.

The resolution urged Iran to take further measures ``to
promote full and equal enjoyment by women and girls of
their human rights,'' to eliminate religious
discrimination, to end the use of torture, and to abolish
the death penalty for crimes by those under the age of
18.

Hard-liners, who control unelected key institutions,
including the judiciary and police, have closed reformist
newspapers and jailed dozens of reformist journalists and
political activists, most of them without trial.

The reformist press supports President Mohammad Khatami's
program of increased social and political freedom. But
hard-liners accuse it of undermining the principles of
the 1979 revolution.

Massoud Rajavi, president of the National Council of
Resistance of Iran, an opposition group, said that 4 1/2
years after Khatami took office there has been a serious
backsliding on human rights.

He said the Iranian people in recent uprisings have
showing their opposition to the hard-liners and their
support for ``the establishment of democracy'' in Iran.

*********************************************************

ENEMY OF MY ENEMY, THE NEW YORK TIMES, NOVEMBER 29
[Excerpts from an opinion column by William Safire]

WASHINGTON -- Here is the modern corollary to a Middle
Eastern proverb: The enemy of my enemy can be my enemy,
too.  Iran's Shiites despise the Taliban Sunnis;
fundamentalists of both branches of Islam have long been
killing one another. Iran's ayatollahs also hate another
U.S. enemy, Saddam Hussein of Iraq, who killed a half
million Persians in the Iran-Iraq war.

Does that enmity of our enemies make Iran our friend? You
might deduce that from the warm handshake extended to
Iran's foreign minister by Secretary of State Colin
Powell at the U.N. last week, the first such contact
since the mass kidnapping at our Tehran embassy in 1979.
Or from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld when asked by
Bob Schieffer of CBS about Iranian liaison with U.S.
forces in Afghanistan: "You're going to see new
relationships coming out all across the globe."

That's because we've been falling for the
tough-cop-nice-cop routine from Tehran. Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei, who rules as Iran's religious commander,
punishes dissenters as he spews hatred of Israel and
"Great Satan" America.
Meanwhile, nice-cop President Mohammad Khatami condemns
the Sept. 11 attacks and supports the Afghan rebels,
feeding dreams of "moderation" in bloom.

But reformers in Iran's Parliament are repeatedly
squelched by Khamenei's ruthless Guardian Council.
Suppressed Iranians now know that front man Khatami's
election led to a false spring.
Fifty newspapers have since been closed; the vigilantes
of Hezbollah, the "Party of God," are urged by clerics to
beat up students with democratic yearnings; savage public
executions are on the rise. When rumors spread last month
that the government had bribed soccer players to lose a
World Cup qualifying match, tens of thousands marched in
the streets to denounce the ayatollahs and to hail
America.

In our State Department's most recent report on global
terrorism, Iran beat out Iraq and Syria to win the title
of "most active state sponsor of terrorism." This
conclusion, unwelcome to dovish policy makers at Foggy
Bottom, was not lightly arrived at. Evidence is mounting
that Tehran sponsored the killing of Americans at Khobar
Towers in Saudi Arabia...

...Local tyranny and global terror go hand in hand.
That's why we should resist strange antiterrorist
bedfellowship with Iran's tough-cop-nice-cop rulers. Iran
is becoming ripe for democratic revolution. We should not
ally ourselves with the cruel clerics whom secular
Persian patriots will one day throw out.











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