Gross Human Rights Violations Perpetrated by the Iranian Theocratic Regime Against the People of Balochistan, BPP

One example for this deplorable situation is the case of a group of young Baloch fishermen. Being just an ordinary crew on a fishing boat on the Gulf, they were arrested and accused of drug trafficking. Later, they were executed, following a kangaroo trial and without them having had access to defence lawyers or a just trial.

In recent months, the security forces of the Islamic regime of Iran have intensified their systematic use of cruel human rights violations against Baloch people, using in particular extrajudicial executions and killings to terrorize the population.

Worse still, the Iranian authorities systematically target young Baloch men by first trapping and illegally detaining them, accusing them of drug trafficking, to then obtain ‘confessions’ through the use of torture. This labelling of innocent civilians as drug traffickers is a well-known strategy used by the regime in Tehran to physically eliminate the Baloch people, and has been used by the regime ever since it seized power. Amnesty International, in one of its reports, also highlighted that the Iranian regime systematically executes Baloch activists under the pretext of fighting drug trafficking .

National and international media, as well as the international community remain silent and fail to improve or even just acknowledge the horrible human rights situation in Balochistan. Leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran interpret this silence as a sign of approval or at least disregard for the gross human rights violation perpetrated against Baloch civilians. Tragically, it thus does not come at a surprise that Iran has one of the highest rates of executions in the world, while the rate of executions of Baloch people is the highest in Iran.

One example for this deplorable situation is the case of a group of young Baloch fishermen. Being just an ordinary crew on a fishing boat on the Gulf, they were arrested and accused of drug trafficking. Later, they were executed, following a kangaroo trial and without them having had access to defense lawyers or a just trial. On 10 September 2016, the young Baloch were executed in Bandarabbas, a city on the Northern coast of the Gulf. According to the Balochistan Human Rights Groups, the families of these young men pointed out that their executed family members had been their families’ breadwinners and had been out for a fishing trip when they were arrested and later accused of being drug traffickers.

In another act of cruelty, on 30 August 2016, the Iranian intelligence service paid a visit to the home of civil and human rights activist Mr. Aamer Sotvan, whose wife and children were not at home at the time. The next morning (31 August 2016), his hanged body was found in his home. The door to his home was locked from the outside.

Further examples of cases of gross human rights violations against Baloch people, perpetrated by the Iranian regime are:
– 21 August 2016: Execution of Mr. Habib Jamalzahi Bandarabbas
– 18 August 2016: Execution of Mr. Reza Naroui, in the city of Sirjan
According to Ms. Roya Boroumand, Head of the Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation, “it is becoming more difficult to track executions of Balochis, as Iranian authorities increasingly move Balochi prisoners outside the region” .
It is time for the international community to react to the gross and intensified human rights violations perpetrated by the Islamic Republic of Iran against Baloch people. The Balochistan People’s Party urges the international community to:
– Put pressure on the Islamic regime of Iran to respect its own law by allowing the presence of detainees’ defense lawyers in prisons and courts, so that they can defend their clients.
– Immediately put an end to extra-judicial killings of the people of Balochistan.

Balochistan Peoples Party

Publisher: bb