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Update on Action in Solidarity with Iranian Detainees
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Gita Hashemi
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Jun 20, 2006 12:14 PDT
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Please forward.
Update on:
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Subject: Electronic Solidarity Action
Dates: June 16 - 19, 2006
Go to: http://opinionware.net/iran
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Thanks to everybody who participated in this solidarity action, the
website of the Iranian Presidency drastically slowed down and came to
a halt several times on the 18th and 19th of June. We can be sure
they have received the word.
We are ending this action, for now, with an urgent note:
Although reports indicate that many people who were arrested on June
12 at the site of the demonstration have been released on bail, this
does not show an entirely positive development in the situation. The
following remain urgent and key concerns:
1- So far, the reports issued from human rights organizations - such
as Amnesty International and Human Rights First - have relied on
information released by the Iranian authorities. The official number
of detainees as stated by the spokesperson for Ministry of Justice
did NOT include those who were arrested several hours before the
demonstration and some who were picked up in the following days.
There is no news on the fate of the detainees who were NOT counted in
the official figures and have NOT been released. The lack of
accurate and independently verifiable information about all of the
individuals detained in relation to June 12th demo is a serious cause
for alarm.
2- Ali Akbar Mousavi Khoini, one of the people who is still in prison
- that we know of - is in grave danger. Reports coming from Farsi
language sources (http://r0ozonline.com/01newsstory/016181.shtml)
indicate that the authorities are subjecting him and other political
prisoners and their families to pressures to submit to forced
confessions to crimes against the state and recantation of their
political positions. The reenactment of the infamous tactics the
Islamic government used in prisons against dissenters at the height
of political repression in the 1980s signals a dangerous regression
in the country's political climate. Please join the Human Rights
First campaign for immediate and unconditional release of Mousavi
Khoini at
http://action.humanrightsfirst.org/campaign/Khoini?rk=fdMOIoK1ZBzME
3- A few of the organizers of the 12 June demonstration who escaped
the crackdown - all prominent activists in the Iranian women's
movement - have been forced to go underground. There is no confirmed
news of their safety.
4- The June 12th detainees who were released have had to put up bail
and must attend the Revolutionary Court (dadsaray-e enghelab) again
on as yet unclear charges. Given their large number and the limited
and already-stretched resources of human rights lawyers and activists
in Iran, the adequacy of their legal defense is a matter of concern.
5- Although not directly related to the 12th June events, the
continued imprisonment of the prominent Iranian-Canadian scholar
Ramin Jahanbegloo in spite of international campaigns for his release
is an indication of the ongoing highly dangerous conditions for
Iranian dissenters, women and men.
(http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/05/05/iran13312.htm)
It is highly important to continue to remain engaged and vigilant.
With over one hundred years of recorded history, the indigenous
women's movement in Iran has consistently been a strong political
force and thus a main target of repressive and coercive politics.
(http://www.merip.org/mero/mero061606.html) The current
international political climate caused by the US administration's
pressures on Iran to abandon the development of nuclear power has
created the perfect excuse for the Iranian government to increase its
campaign of domestic repression under the banner of national unity
and defense of Iranian sovereignty- similar to what happened 25 years
ago with the start of the Iraq-Iran war - and divert national and
international attention away from Iran's indigenous movement for
democratic change. In this process, Iranian women's movement for
equal rights once again is becoming the prime target of the Islamic
fundamentalist government.
We strongly condemn the neo-colonial wars in the Middle East and the
domestic and international aggression by the U.S. administration and
its allies, and oppose their interventionist and capitalist
expansionist politics that are hidden under the facade of
"international security," "liberating the people," and "democratizing
the states". It is quite clear from the current situations in
Afghanistan and Iraq that their Western-instituted states are
perfectly willing to deny and compromise - in their constitutions and
in practice - women's demands for social equality and freedom.
While it is necessary to be vigilant against racism and propaganda
directed at Islamic and other immigrant communities in the Western
countries, we would like to remind the progressive international and
feminist communities that the enemy of our enemy is not our friend.
It is possible to oppose anti-Islamic racism in the West and
simultaneously stand in solidarity with indigenous women's rights and
other democratic movements in Islamic countries and diasporic
communities. There must be no ethical and political confusion and
compromise: Equal rights are women's rights, the world over.
Pending the news from Iran, we may have to call for another
solidarity action. We will update the action site as necessary.
Please stay alert and engaged.
We thank Creative Response, OpinionWare and Electronic Disturbance
Theatre for their support of this action.
For equality and peace,
Sirens of Solidarity
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