Minority report: Why Baha’is face persecution in Iran
By Babak Dehghanpisheh
The Islamic Republic's 34-year rule has hurt many religious
and political groups in Iran, but one community has borne an especially heavy
burden: the Baha'is, a religious minority viewed as heretics by some Muslims.
Dozens of Baha'is were killed or jailed in the years
immediately following the Islamic revolution in 1979. Billions of dollars worth
of land, houses, shops and other Baha'i belongings were seized in subsequent
years by various Iranian organizations, including Setad, the organization
overseen by Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The United Nations office of the Baha'i International
Community, a non-governmental organization, estimates that more than 2,000
homes, shops, orchards and other properties were seized from its members in
Iran up to 2003, the most recent figure available. The property was then worth
about $10 billion.
PROTEST: Photos of Baha'i religious leaders who have been
arrested in Iran. Protesters arranged them on Brazil's Copacabana Beach in
2011. REUTERS/Stringer
"It's really one of the most obvious cases of state
persecution," Heiner Bielefeldt, the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of
religion or belief, said about the treatment of Baha'is in Iran at a United
Nations conference in Geneva this year. "It's basically state persecution,
systematic and covering all areas of state activities, the various systems from
family law provisions to schooling, education, security."
One reason clerics in Iran have targeted the group with such
zeal is the fact devout Muslims see the Baha'i faith as heresy and an insult to
the teachings of Islam. The religion started in 1844 in the southern city of
Shiraz when a man named Bab announced the coming of a messenger of God. In
1863, one of Bab's followers named Baha'ullah declared himself to be the
messenger and began preaching a message of unity among faiths. His followers
were attacked and he spent years in exile, dying in the city of Acre, in what
was then Palestine, in 1892.
During most of the 20th century, the monarchs ruling Iran
tolerated Baha'is, though there were periodic arrests and attacks against
members of the community, according to historians.
After the Islamic revolution, the group was targeted again.
While Jews and Christians were recognized as religious minorities in the new
constitution, Baha'is were not. Hundreds of Baha'is were expelled from
universities or had their businesses attacked or their properties confiscated,
members of the community say.
The Iranian government did not respond to a request for
comment.
The Baha'i International Community estimates there are
300,000 Baha'is left in Iran. In late July, Khamenei issued an edict stating
that Iranians should avoid all dealings with Baha'is, according to Iran's
Tasnim news agency.
An Iranian lawyer who represented more than half a dozen
Baha'i clients in recent cases involving confiscated property says he was
called in for questioning by intelligence agents last year and threatened. The
lawyer, who is Muslim and spoke on condition he not be named, told Reuters he
had to stop accepting Baha'i clients.
"The government has set up a system where Baha'is are
not allowed to build up financial strength," said the lawyer.
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