How Iran crushes dissent

2004-06-07 08:06

Cairo, Egypt - Iranian judges have detained and tortured writers, student leaders and political activists in secret prisons and muzzled reform-minded newspapers to "shut down" dissent, Human Rights Watch said in a report on Monday.

"There is widespread agreement that the political environment has become increasingly abusive and defined by force," Human Rights Watch said in a 73-page report.

The report, Like the Dead in Their Coffins: Torture, Detention, and the Crushing of Dissent in Iran, echoed the pessimism of Iran's reformist President Mohammad Khatami, who has all but conceded defeat in his struggle with hard-liners.

The Iranian judiciary is seen as firmly in the hands of hard-liners, led by Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. New York-based Human Rights Watch said the judiciary was "at the centre of the human rights violations" documented in its report.

During his first four-year presidential term, Khatami had managed to relax some of the country's strict Islamic laws and allow greater media freedoms. By the time of Khatami's second-term victory in 2001, hard-liners were fighting back, shutting down more than 100 publications and detaining dozens of activists for criticising unelected hard-line clerics.

Silence the opposition

"The Iranian authorities have managed, in the span of four years, to virtually silence the political opposition within the country through the systematic use of indefinite solitary confinement of political prisoners, physical torture of student activists and denial of basic due process rights to all those detained for the expression of dissenting views," Human Rights Watch said.

"A small group of judges accountable only to (Khamenei) has shut down public dissent," the group added, saying the judges had vigilantes and security agents at their disposal to detain and interrogate dissidents, hid their activities in secret prisons and shut down newspapers that had spoken up for political prisoners.

Human Rights Watch, describing the future as "bleak," said: "The authorities have largely succeeded in their campaign to send a message to the broader public that the costs of voicing peaceful political criticism are unbearably high."

Human Rights Watch interviewed former political prisoners outside Iran. Many were afraid to allow their names to be used or speak openly inside Iran. They described beatings and long stays in windowless, soundproof solitary cells described as "coffins".

Human Rights Watch singled out Tehran prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi, a former judge, in its report. As a judge, Mortazavi ordered the closure of scores of reformist newspapers. Human Rights Watch said he "has been personally involved in a number of coercive interrogations, threats against individual arrestees, and has even allegedly given the order for individual arrestees to be physically abused."

In April, Iran's unelected clerics honoured Mortazavi as "best manager" in the judiciary.

- AP