Aug08
Iranian Baha’i leaders sentenced to 20 years in prison, reports say
Baha’i World News Service– The Baha’i International Community has received reports indicating that seven Iranian Baha’i leaders have each received jail sentences of 20 years.
The two women and five men have been held in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison since they were arrested in 2008 – six of them on May 14 and one of them two months earlier.
“If this news proves to be accurate, it represents a deeply shocking outcome to the case of these innocent and harmless people,” said Bani Dugal, the principal representative of the Baha’i International Community to the United Nations.
“We understand that they have been informed of this sentence and that their lawyers are in the process of launching an appeal,” said Ms. Dugal.
The prisoners – Fariba Kamalabadi, Jamaloddin Khanjani, Afif Naeimi, Saeid Rezaie, Mahvash Sabet, Behrouz Tavakkoli, and Vahid Tizfahm – were all members of a national-level group that helped see to the minimum needs of Iran’s 300,000-strong Baha’i community, the country’s largest non-Muslim religious minority.
- Read the full story from Baha’i World News Service
- Media coverage: CNN, The Los Angeles Times, Radio Free Europe, Reuters, Religion News Service
- Blog coverage: The Huffington Post, The Houston Chronicle’s “Houston Belief” blog, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Freedom House, Muslim Network for Baha’i Rights, Iran Press Watch, International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, International Federation for Human Rights, Georgetown Security Law Brief, Enduring America
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