Rally in front of the Iranian Embassy in Berlin

 English version – from European Democratic Lawyers – please scroll down

Republican Lawyers' Association (RAV)
www.rav.de

Association
of Democratic Lawyers
(VdJ)
www.vdj.de

 

To protest against human rights violations and the systematic state persecution of lawyers in Iran, the EDA (European Democratic Lawyers), the VDJ (Association of Democratic Lawyers) and the RAV eV call for participation in the rally on December 9, 2010.
On the eve of International Human Rights Day, protest rallies will take place simultaneously in Rome, Brussels, Madrid, La Hague and Paris.

Since the protests against President Ahmadinejad's re-election in June 2009, the situation for people exercising their constitutionally guaranteed rights to freedom of expression, assembly, and association has dramatically worsened. Lawyers are increasingly and systematically affected by this development, leading to a worrying deterioration in the situation for all those who are or have been subjected to state violence and repression. In some cases, the lawyers' lawyers are now imprisoned (e.g., Mohammad Olyaeifard, Nasrin Sotoodeh).

Even in the run-up to the elections, countless human rights organizations and lawyers' associations had been banned (including the CHRD (Center for Human Rights Defenders) in December 2008 and the ADPR (Association for the Defence of Prisoners' Rights) in August 2009) and members of NGOs (including the CHRR (Committee for Human Rights Reports) or HRAI (Human Rights Activists in Iran)) had been arrested or pressured.

Since the election, lawyers who were or are members of this or other NGOs, represent opposition members, or publicly criticize the human rights situation in their own country have been systematically persecuted.

There has been a surge in house and office searches without warrants, summonses, or arrest warrants; these regularly involve the seizure of files, computers, and mobile phones (e.g., Abdolfattah Soltani on June 16, 2009, and Nasrin Sotoudeh on August 28, 2010). Threatening phone calls and the temporary detention of family members are commonplace, as are unjustified tax audits in which lawyers' accounts are frozen and other financial resources are seized (e.g., Nasrin Sotoudeh). If arrested, lawyers face the threat of enforced disappearance, as they are detained without a warrant directly at their workplace (e.g., Mohammad Dadkhah (CHRD) and his colleagues in July 2009) or at home (Emadeddin Baghi (ADPR) in December 2009), and their location is kept secret for weeks. For months, they are often held in detention without charge (Shiva Nazar Ahari (CHRR) December 2009–May 2010). Increasingly, those detained—even those with warrants—are denied any contact with family members and access to their lawyers (e.g., Nasrin Sotoudeh). Lawyers are held in solitary confinement, tortured, and suffer severe health problems (e.g., Emadeddin Baghi (ADPR), Mohammad Olyaeifard (ADPR)).
Since then, countless lawyers and journalists have left Iran (including Shirin Ebadi in June 2009 and Mohammad Mostafai in July 2010) and/or are subject to travel bans (e.g., Nasrin Sotoudeh in December 2008, Abdolreza Tajik (CHRD) in February 2009, and Narges Mohammadi (CHRD) in May 2010).

The persecution of lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, who represents many well-known human rights defenders and political activists (including Shirin Ebadi and M. Olyaeifard), as well as minors on death row, is a prime example. She has publicly spoken out about deficiencies in the rule of law and shortcomings in the judicial administration during her clients' trials.
Following an arbitrary house search on August 28, 2010, she was arrested on September 4, 2010. At the end of September, Nasrin Sotoudeh began a four-week hunger strike; she was granted her first contact with her family on November 3, after two months in detention. Sotoudeh's lawyer, Nasim Ghanavi, resigned her mandate after massive pressure from the authorities and threats of arrest. Further proceedings are pending against her current lawyer, Abdolfattah Soltani, a fellow lawyer of Shirin Ebadi and co-founder of the CHRD, who was arrested in June 2009 and released on bail in August 2009. These proceedings could lead to his imprisonment and expulsion from the bar. In a meeting with the board of the Iranian Bar Association on November 13, 2010, the head of the Iranian judiciary, Sadegh Larijani, announced that lawyers who had been barred from practicing law would not have their licenses reinstated, even after an acquittal. Furthermore, it was ordered that lawyers must renew their licenses annually from now on.

On November 15, 2010, Nasrin Sotoudeh appeared in court to answer charges of "acts against national security," "assembly and conspiracy with the aim of endangering the security of the country," and collaboration with the Iranian human rights center "Centre for Human Rights Defenders" (CHRD). Neither her husband nor any other relatives of Nasrin Sotoudeh, nor the president of the Tehran Bar Association, were permitted to be present in court. A court hearing scheduled for November 24 was canceled due to severe air pollution in Tehran.
On November 23, 2010, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, called for the release of the Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, describing her case as part of a much larger campaign of crackdowns on human rights defenders.
Emadeddin Baghi, chairman of the now-banned ADPR (Association for the Defence of Prisoners' Rights), is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence for a 2008 television interview he gave with Grand Ayatollah Montazeri.
On his website, Baghi states that he has been summoned to court or for questioning 85 times in the past 30 years: he was once fined, banned from publishing 13 books, prohibited from public activity for five years, and sentenced to a total of 18.5 years in prison, of which he has already served 4.5 years. Baghi's health has been highly unstable ever since.

Our colleagues in Iran need our support.
Protest against human rights violations in Iran on December 9th in front of the Iranian Embassy in Berlin. Colleagues are requested to wear robes.

ADPR (Association for the Defence of Prisoners' Rights) (closed August 2009)
Emadeddin Baghi (Founder of ADPR)
Mohammad Olyaeifard, lawyer and board member of the human rights organization
"Committee for the Defense of Political Prisoners in Iran"

HRAI (Human Rights Activists in Iran) (not banned):
On March 2, 2010, security forces searched the homes and offices of at least
29 members of the Iranian NGO Human Rights Activists in Iran. Fifteen people were arrested.
ABOLFAZL ABEDINI NASR (sentenced to 11 years in prison)

(CHRR) Committee for Human Rights Reports (not banned)
Committee of Human Rights Reporters
Shiva Nazar Ahari (detained for more than 5 months without charge after arrest on December 20, 2009
, released on bail (€390,000) on September 12, 2010, sentenced on September 18, 2010 to 6 years in prison and 76 lashes)
Said Haeri (detained December 20, 2009 – March 13, 2010)
Said Jalalifar
Parisa Kakayi
Mehrdad Rahimi
Kouhyar Goudarzi

CHRD (Center for Human Rights Defenders)
Mohammad Dadkhah,
Hadi Esmailzadeh,
Narges Mohammadi (Deputy Director of CHRD)
Abdulfattah Soltani (in custody from June 16, 2009 to August 2009, released on bail)
Mohammad Seyfzadeh (sentenced to 9 years in prison, 10-year professional ban)

Equality Campaign "One Million Signatures":
Over 50 campaign participants have been imprisoned since its founding in August 2006 due to their activism.
Mahboubeh Karami (most recently imprisoned from March 2, 2010 to August 18, 2010, released on bail)

 

Contact person:
Berenice Böhlo, lawyer in Berlin, member of the board of the RAV,
Tel. 030.692 877 20

European

Democratic Lawyers​
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European Democratic Lawyers (www.aed-edl.net) is a confederation of lawyer associations from 6 European countries: Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Belgium and The Netherlands.

Among its aims are defense of the rights of the defense lawyers, to preserve their physical integrity and to ensure that lawyers can work in freedom and will not be threatened.

The AED has decided to choose the day before the day of the Human Rights, the 9th of December, to be

The Day of the Endangered Lawyer
In 2010 the attention will be focused in particular on the situation of lawyers in Iran.

Last year the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 2003 the prominent lawyer Shirin Ibadi, defender of women's rights and children, was forced to leave Iran because she was in fear of her life.

Three lawyers of Sakineh Ashtiani (sentenced to death by stoning for adultery) are confronted with serious attacks on their work and well-being.
The first lawyer, Mohammad Mostafaei, was forced to leave Iran and is currently in Norway after his wife had been arrested; the next lawyer of Sakineh Ashtiani, Javid Houtan Kian, was arrested and put in prison at Tabriz; the following lawyer of Sakineh Ashtiani, Sara Sabbaghian has also been arrested, at November 13 2010.

These are only a few examples: in this way in the last two years more then 20 lawyers in Iran are threatened and prosecuted; in several ways the Government tries to make the exercise of their profession impossible.

We have noticed that the Human Rights Commission of the United Nations General Assemblee – in her meeting on the 18th of November 2010 – has expressed her grave concerns about the human rights situation in Iran based on numerous cases of human rights violations.

On December the 9th 2010, in 6 European cities, The Hague, Berlin, Rome, Madrid, Paris and Brussels, a demonstration of lawyers in gowns/togas will take place at the Iranian Embassies, at which occasion lawyers will express their concern about the violation of human rights, in particular concerning the situation of the lawyers in Iran.
In this demonstration a petition will be handed over to the highest Iranian authorities through the several ambassadors in which among others will be asked to give a group of European lawyers the opportunity to do a fact-finding mission in Iran.

The Iranian Embassy is located at the Podbielskiallee 67, in 14195 Berlin.