The Islamic Republic is not and will not be the future of Iran
Written by ACI in 23 February 21Secretary-General of the United Nations – Mr António Guterres
President of the United States – Mr Joe Biden
President of France – Mr Emanuel Macron
Chancellor of Germany – Dr Angela Merkel
Prime Minister on the United Kingdom Boris Johnson
The recent political changes in the United States can lead to dialogue with the Islamic Republic on the issue of JCPOA and open doors to fresh economic deals with an attractive market such as Iran. However, neither will have any positive impact on the lives of the Iranian people.
There is no need to refer to discriminatory laws, religious persecution, abject poverty, marginalisation, disillusionment, dissatisfaction, managed factionalism within the regime, state sponsor terrorism that has a global reach or even institutional systematic corruption, embezzlement and money laundering that also adversely impact the global community, instead we would like to highlight the following three cases that have happened in the last few days as indication of the type of regime you are planning to negotiate and trade with, a regime that has no regard for its own people:
- A forty two year old woman, Zahra Esmaeili, was the seventeenth person to be executed on 17 February 2021 in Rajaie Shahr prison in Karaj. Witnessing the executions of sixteen people in front of her she suffered a heart attack and according to her lawyer died. Nevertheless she was pulled up on the rope and hanged. She and her two children were arrested for the murder of her abusive husband. She took the blame for the killing and was sentenced to death in 2018.
- Thirty three years old prisoner, Behnam Mahjoubi, a member of the persecuted Gonabadi Dervish order was summoned to serve his two year prison term. Following his original arrest in April 2018 he was under the care of a psychiatrist for serious panic disorder. The public medical examiner confirmed and certified that Mahjoubi was not fit to served time. Nevertheless, he was imprisoned at Tehran Evin prison on 20 June 2020. Following promises that he would receive the prescribed medication by his own specialist Mahjoubi stopped his hunger strike on 1 August. In September 2020, the prison clinic’s doctor pressured him to take sleeping tablets apparently to control his panic disorder, after which he suffered seizures and partial paralysis. During his time in prison until his final transfer to hospital on 13 February 2021, he was taken to a psychiatric unit on multiple occasions where he was ill treated, tortured and injected with chemical substances against his will and without information about what was administered. In a recorded message he told his wife he was stripped, shackled to the bed while they peed on him and performed acts that he was too embarrassed to say. On 13 February 2021 he was finally transferred to hospital and fell into a coma. On 16 February 2021, his friends and family announced his death but that was denied by hospital authorities who kept him artificially breathing on life support system until 22 February when he was finally declared dead.
- On 22 February border police shot directly at a group of cross border carriers (sookhtbar) in Saravan located in Balochistan province of Iran. Unofficial figures estimate thirty-seven dead and many more injured. So far, the identity of fifteen of the deceased has been determined. Protest against the mass killings on 23 February was also met with brute force and internet access was cut. Reports of many arrests and injured are coming in as we write this letter.
The above cases demonstrate where the Islamic Republic is after forty two years. The Islamic regime lies and cheats its own people.
The Islamic Republic is not and will not be the future of Iran.
Hossein Ladjevardi
Founding President – ACI
Paris – February 23, 2021