Akbar Ganji -- Iran's leading political dissident --
has written an "Open Letter" to the UN Secretary General. This
letter comes in response to the human rights crackdown inside
Iran and threats against it from the
Bush Administration.
Mr. Ganji's letter has been endorsed
by over 300 public intellectuals, writers, and Nobel Laureates from around the
world and has been released to coincide with Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad's arrival in NY.
For background on Akbar Ganji
see:
http://www.ichrdd.ca/site/media/index.php?id=2140&subsection=news
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akbar_Ganji
September
18, 2007
To
His Excellency Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United
Nations,
The
people of Iran are experiencing difficult times
both internationally and domestically.
Internationally, they face the threat of a military attack from the
US and the imposition of extensive
sanctions by the UN Security Council.
Domestically, a despotic state has – through constant and organized
repression – imprisoned them in a life and death situation.
Far
from helping the development of democracy, US policy over the past 50 years has consistently
been to the detriment of the proponents of freedom and democracy in
Iran. The 1953 coup against the
nationalist government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq and the unwavering
support for the despotic regime of the Shah, who acted as America's gendarme in the Persian Gulf, are just two examples of these flawed
policies. More recently the
confrontation between various US Administrations and the Iranian state over the
past three decades has made internal conditions very difficult for the
proponents of freedom and human rights in Iran. Exploiting the danger posed by the
US, the Iranian regime has put
military-security forces in charge of the government, shut down all independent
domestic media, and is imprisoning human rights activists on the pretext that
they are all agents of a foreign enemy.
The Bush Administration, for its part, by approving a fund for democracy
assistance in Iran, which has in fact being largely spent on official
institutions and media affiliated with the US government, has made it easy for
the Iranian regime to describe its opponents as mercenaries of the US and to
crush them with impunity. At the
same time, even speaking about "the possibility" of a military attack on
Iran makes things extremely
difficult for human rights and pro-democracy activists in Iran. No Iranian
wants to see what happened to Iraq or Afghanistan repeated in Iran. Iranian democrats also watch with deep
concern the support in some American circles for separatist movements in
Iran. Preserving Iran's territorial integrity is important to all
those who struggle for democracy and human rights in Iran. We want democracy for
Iran and for all Iranians. We also believe that the dismemberment
of Middle Eastern countries will fuel widespread and prolonged conflict in the
region. In order to help the
process of democratization in the Middle East, the US can best help
by promoting a just peace between the Palestinians and Israelis, and pave the
way for the creation of a truly independent Palestinian state alongside the
State of Israel. A just resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the
establishment of a Palestinian state would inflict the heaviest blow on the
forces of fundamentalism and terrorism in the Middle
East.
Your
Excellency,
Iran's
dangerous international situation and the consequences of Iran's dispute
with the West have totally deflected the world's attention and especially the
attention of the United Nations from the intolerable conditions that the Iranian
regime has created for the Iranian people.
The dispute over the enrichment of uranium should not make the world
forget that, although the 1979 revolution of Iran was a
popular revolution, it did not lead to the formation of a democratic system that
protects human rights. The Islamic
Republic is a fundamentalist state that does not afford official recognition to
the private sphere. It represses civil society and violates human rights. Thousands of political prisoners were
executed during the first decade after the revolution without fair trials or due
process of the law, and dozens of dissidents and activists were assassinated
during the second decade. Independent newspapers are constantly being banned and
journalists are sent to prison. All
news websites are filtered and books are either refused publication permits or
are slashed with the blade of censorship before publication. Women are totally deprived of equality
with men and, when they demand equal rights, they are accused of acting against
national security, subjected to various types of intimidation and have to endure
various penalties, including long prison terms. In the first decade of the 21st century,
stoning (the worst form of torture leading to death) is one of the sentences
that Iranians face on the basis of existing laws. A number of Iranian teachers, who took
part in peaceful civil protests over their pay and conditions, have been
dismissed from their jobs and some have even been sent into internal exile in
far-flung regions or jailed.
Iranian workers are deprived of the right to establish independent
unions. Workers who ask to be
allowed to form unions in order to struggle for their corporate rights are
beaten and imprisoned. Iranian
university students have paid the highest costs in recent years in defence of
liberty, human rights and democracy.
Security organizations prevent young people who are critical of the
official state orthodoxy from gaining admission into university, and those who
do make it through the rigorous ideological and political vetting process have
no right to engage in peaceful protest against government policies.
If
students' activities displease the governing elites, they are summarily expelled
from university and in many instances jailed. The Islamic Republic has also been
expelling dissident professors from universities for about a quarter of a
century. In the meantime, in the
Islamic Republic's prisons, opponents are forced to confess to crimes that they
have not committed and to express remorse.
These confessions, which have been extracted by force, are then broadcast
on the state media in a manner reminiscent of Stalinist show-trials. There are no fair, competitive elections
in Iran; instead, elections are stage
managed and rigged. And even people
who find their way into parliament and into the executive branch of government
have no powers or resources to alter the status quo. All the legal and extra-legal powers are
in the hands of the Iran's top leader, who rules like a
despotic sultan.
Your
Excellency,
Are
you aware that in Iran political dissidents, human
rights activists and pro-democracy campaigners are legally deprived of "the
right to life"? On the basis of
Article 226 of the Islamic Penal Law and Note 2 of Paragraph E of Section B of
Article 295 of the same law any person can unilaterally decide that another
human being has forfeited the right to life and kill them in the name of
performing one's religious duty to rid society of vice.
Over the past few decades, many dissidents and activists have been killed on the
basis of this article and the killers have been acquitted in court. In such circumstances, no dissident or
activist has a right to life in Iran, because, on the basis of
Islamic jurisprudence and the laws of the Islamic Republic, the definition of
those who have forfeited the right to life (mahduroldam) is very
broad.
Are
you aware that, in Iran, writers are lawfully banned
from writing? On the basis of Note
2 of Paragraph 8 of Article 9 of the Press Law, writers who are convicted of
"propaganda against the ruling system" are deprived for life of "the right to
all press activity". In recent years, many writers and journalists have been
convicted of propaganda against the ruling system. The court's verdicts make it clear that
any criticism of state bodies is deemed to be propaganda against the ruling
system.
Your
Excellency,
The
people of Iran and Iranian advocates for
freedom and democracy are experiencing difficult days. They need the moral support of the
proponents of freedom throughout the world and effective intervention by the
United Nations. We categorically reject a military attack on Iran. At the same time, we ask you and all of
the world's intellectuals and proponents of liberty and democracy to condemn the
human rights violations of the Iranian state. We expect from Your Excellency, in your
capacity as the Secretary-General of the United Nations, to reprimand the
Iranian government – in keeping with your legal duties – for its extensive
violation of the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other
international human rights covenants and treaties.
Above
all, we hope that with Your Excellency's immediate intervention, all of
Iran's political prisoners, who are
facing more deplorable conditions with every passing day, will soon be released.
The people of Iran are asking themselves whether
the UN Security Council is only decisive and effective when it comes to the
suspension of the enrichment of uranium, and whether the lives of the Iranian
people are unimportant as far as the Security Council is concerned. The people
of Iran are entitled to freedom,
democracy and human rights. We Iranians hope that the United Nations and all the
forums that defend democracy and human rights will be unflinching in their
support for Iran's quest for freedom and
democracy.
Yours
Sincerely,
Akbar
Ganji
Endorsed
by:
1.
Jürgen
Habermas (J.W.Goethe Universitaet, Frankfurt)
2.
Charles
Taylor (McGill
University)
3.
Noam
Chomsky (MIT)
4.
Ronald
Dworkin (New York
University)
5.
Robert Bellah
(University of California, Berkeley)
6.
Alasdair MacIntyre
(University of
Notre Dame)
7.
Orhan Pamuk (Recipient
of the 2006 Nobel Prize for Literature)
8.
J.M. Coetzee
(Recipient of the 2003 Nobel Prize for Literature)
9.
Seamus Heaney
(Recipient of the 1995 Nobel Prize for Literature)
10.
Nadine Gordimer
(Recipient of 1991 Nobel Prize for Literature)
11.
Mairead
Corrigan-Maguire (Recipient of the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize)
12.
Umberto Eco (novelist,
Italy)
13.
Mario Vargas Llosa (novelist,
Peru)
14.
Isabel Allende
(novelist, Chile)
15.
Robert Dahl
(Yale
University)
16.
Michael Walzer
(Princeton
University)
17.
Seyla
Benhabib (Yale
University)
18.
Cornel
West (Princeton
University)
19.
Michael
Sandel (Harvard
University)
20.
Eric
Hobsbawm (Birbeck College, University of London)
21.
Stanley Hoffman (Harvard University)
22.
Nancy
Fraser (New School for Social Research)
23.
Philip
Pettit (Princeton
University)
24.
Slavoj Žižek
(University of
Ljubljana)
25.
Daniel
A. Bell (Tsinghua
University)
26.
Nikki
Keddie (UCLA)
27.
Marshall
Berman (City College of New York)
28.
Hilary Putnam
(Harvard
University)
29.
Robert Putnam
(Harvard
University)
30.
Alan Ryan (Oxford University)
31.
Zygmunt Bauman
(University of
Leeds)
32.
Richard J. Bernstein
(New School
University)
33.
Nicholas Wolterstorff
(Yale
University)
34.
Talal Asad
(City University of New York Graduate Center)
35.
Joshua
Cohen (Stanford University and Boston Review
Magazine)
36.
Fred Dallmayr
(University of
Notre Dame)
37.
Richard
Falk (Princeton
University)
38.
Harvey
Cox (Harvard
University)
39.
Stephen
Holmes (New York
University)
40.
Andrew
Arato (New School for
Social Research and University of Frankfurt)
41.
Jose Casanova
(New
School for Social Research)
42.
Charles
Tilly (Columbia
University)
43.
David
Held (London
School of
Economics)
44.
Joseph Raz (Oxford and Columbia University)
45.
Steven Lukes
(New York
University)
46.
Claus
Offe (Humboldt University,
Berlin)
47.
Axel Honneth
(J.W.Goethe Universitaet, Frankfurt)
48.
Khaled Abou El Fadl
(UCLA)
49.
Nasr Hamed Abu Zayd
(University of
Humanistics)
50.
Abdullahi
An Na'im (Emory
University)
51.
Saad
Eddin Ibrahim (American University of Cairo)
52.
Abdulkader Tayob
(University of
Capetown)
53.
Zakia
Salime (Michigan
State University)
54.
Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (Harvard University)
55.
Charles S. Maier
(Harvard
University)
56.
Sara Roy (Harvard University)
57.
William
A. Graham (Harvard
University)
58.
Elaine
Bernard (Harvard
University)
59.
Alexander Keyssar
(Harvard
University)
60.
Farid
Esack (Harvard
University)
61.
Kwame Anthony Appiah
(Princeton
University)
62.
Alexander Nehamas
(Princeton
University)
63.
Anne-Marie Slaughter
(Princeton
University)
64.
Jeffrey
Stout (Princeton
University)
65.
Mirjam Kunkler
(Princeton
University)
66.
Partha Chatterjee
(Columbia
University)
67.
Todd Gitlin
(Columbia
University)
68.
Akeel Bilgrami
(Columbia
University)
69.
Saskia Sassen
(Columbia
University)
70.
Nadia
Urbinati (Columbia
University)
71.
Arthur
Danto (Columbia
University)
72.
Claudio Lomnitz
(Columbia
University)
73.
Lila Abu-Lughod
(Columbia
University)
74.
Gauri Viswanathan
(Columbia
University)
75.
William
R. Roff (Columbia University & University of Edinburgh)
76.
Alfred
Stepan (Columbia
University)
77.
Timothy
Mitchell (New York
University)
78.
Tony Judt (New York University)
79.
Zachary
Lockman (New York University)
80.
Adam
Przeworski(New
York University)
81.
Dipesh
Chakrabarty
(University of
Chicago)
82.
Fred
Donner (University
of Chicago)
83.
Manuela Carneiro da
Cunha (University
of Chicago)
84.
Avi
Shlaim (Oxford
University)
85.
Richard
Caplan (Oxford
University)
86.
Alan Macfarlane
(University of
Cambridge)
87.
Mary Kaldor
(London
School of Economics)
88.
Paul Gilroy
(London
School of Economics)
89.
Richard Sennett
(London
School of Economics)
90.
Leslie Sklair
(London
School of Economics and
Political Science)
91.
Sami Zubaida
(Birbeck College, University of London)
92.
Veena
Das (Johns
Hopkins University)
93.
William Connolly
(Johns
Hopkins University)
94.
Richard Wolin
(City University of New York Graduate Center)
95.
Stanley Aronowitz
(City University of New York Graduate Center)
96.
Adam Hochschild
(writer, USA)
97.
Rabbi
Michael Lerner (Editor, Tikkun Magazine)
98.
Cherif
Bassiouni (DePaul
University)
99.
Benjamin
Barber (University
of Maryland)
100.
Ashis Nandy (Centre
for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi)
101.
Ariel Dorfman
(Duke
University)
102.
Ziauddin Sardar
(City University, London)
103.
W. J. T. Mitchell
(Editor, Critical Inquiry)
104.
Howard
Zinn (Boston
University)
105.
Stephen
Lewis (McMaster
University)
106.
Michael
Bérubé (Penn
State University)
107.
Steven Nadler
(University of Wisconsin-Madison)
108.
Ernesto Laclau
(University of
Essex)
109.
Chantal Mouffe
(University of
Westminster)
110.
Eduardo
Galeano (Writer, Uruguay)
111.
Achille Mbembe
(University of the Witwatersrand)
112.
Robert Boyers (Editor,
Salmagundi)
113.
Joe Sacco (Graphic
Novelist)
114.
Adam
Shatz (The Nation
Magazine)
115.
Arjun Appadurai (New
School for Social Research)
116.
Dick
Howard (Stony Brook University)
117.
John
Esposito (Georgetown University)
118.
Ian Williams (The
Guardian, online columnist)
119.
Ronald Aronson
(Wayne
State University)
120.
Mark
Kingwell (University of Toronto)
121.
Azyumardi Azra
(Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University, Jakarta)
122.
Norman Finkelstein
(American Jewish Dissident Intellectual)
123.
David Schweickart
(Loyola
University)
124.
Marcus Raskin
(Institute for Policy Studies)
125.
Juan Cole (University of Michigan)
126.
Carlos
Forment(Centro de Investigación y Documentación de la Vida
Pública)
127.
Ronald Beiner
(University of
Toronto)
128.
David
E. Stannard (University of Hawaii)
129.
Jonathan Rosenbaum
(Film Critic, Chicago Reader)
130.
Stephen Eric Bronner
(Rutgers
University)
131.
Katha Pollitt (The
Nation Magazine)
132.
Charles
Glass (freelance writer, Paris)
133.
John
Keane (University
of Westminster)
134.
Matthew
Rothschild (The Progressive)
135.
Anthony Barnett
(openDemocracy Magazine)
136.
Murat Belge
(Bilgi University, Istanbul)
137.
Michael
Tomasky (Editor, Guardian
America)
138.
Thomas
McCarthy (Yale
University)
139.
Daniel Born (Editor,
The Common Review)
140.
Dušan
Veličković (Editor,
Biblioteka Alexandria, Belgrade)
141.
Chris Toensing
(Middle East Research and Information Project)
142.
Frank Barnaby (Editor,
The International Journal of Human Rights)
143.
Douglass Cassel
(University of
Notre Dame)
144.
Nelofer Pazira
(President, PEN Canada)
145.
Martín
Espada (University of Massachusetts, Amherst)
146.
Douglas
Kellner (UCLA)
147.
William
Shepard (University of
Canterbury, New
Zealand)
148.
David
Ingram (Loyola University Chicago)
149.
Enrique
Krauze (Editor, Letras Libres
Magazine, Mexico City)
150.
Gavin
Kitching (University of New South
Wales, Australia)
151.
Joel Rogers
(University of Wisconsin-Madison)
152.
Martin Shaw
(University of
Sussex)
153.
Carl Boggs
(National University, Los Angeles)
154.
Ahmed Rashid
(Journalist, Lahore)
155.
Thomas Keenan
(Bard
College)
156.
Rafia
Zakaria (Indiana
University)
157.
Michael Thompson
(Logos: A Journal of Modern Society & Culture)
158.
Shadia Drury
(University of
Regina)
159.
Courtney Jung (New
School for Social Research)
160.
Simon Critchley (New
School for Social Research)
161.
Hussein
Ibish (Hala Salaam Maksoud Foundation)
162.
Christopher
Norris (Cardiff
University)
163.
Vinay
Lal (UCLA)
164.
Chris
Hedges (The Nation Institute)
165.
Simon Tormey
(University of
Nottingham)
166.
Melissa Williams
(University of
Toronto)
167.
Sandra Bartky
(University of Illinois at Chicago)
168.
Thomas Sheehan
(Stanford
University)
169.
James Tully
(University of
Victoria)
170.
Asma Afsaruddin
(University of
Notre Dame)
171.
Pankaj
Mishra (writer, India)
172.
Martin
Beck Matuštík (Purdue University)
173.
Stephen
Zunes (University
of San
Francisco)
174.
Stephen
Kinzer (Northwestern University)
175.
Rick
Salutin (Columnist, The Globe and Mail)
176.
James
Reilly (University
of Toronto)
177.
Ayesha
Jalal (Tufts
University)
178.
Ismail
Poonawala (UCLA)
179.
Elizabeth
Hurd (Northwestern University)
180.
Michael
Mann (UCLA)
181.
Patricia
Springborg (Free University of
Bolzano, Italy)
182.
Henry
Munson (University
of Maine)
183.
Charles
Kurzman (University of North
Carolina)
184.
Rohan
Jayasekera (Associate Editor, Index on
Censorship)
185.
Stathis
N. Kalyvas (Yale
University)
186.
Mary
Ann Tetreault (Trinity University)
187.
Robert
Jensen (University of Texas at Austin)
188.
Rashid
Begg (University of
Stellenbosch, South
Africa)
189.
Roxanne L. Euben
(Wellesley
College)
190.
Peter
Mandaville (George
Mason University)
191.
Edward
Friedman (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
192.
Ingrid
Mattson (Hartford Seminary)
193.
Muqtedar
Khan (University
of Delaware)
194.
Duncan
Ivison (University
of Sydney)
195.
Danny
Postel (author, USA)
196.
Mariam
C. Said
197.
Michaelle
Browers (Wake
Forest University)
198.
Tariq
Modood (University
of Bristol)
199.
Ronald
J. Hill (University of Dublin)
200.
Gregory
Baum (McGill
University)
201.
Tamara
Sonn (College of
William and
Mary)
202.
Saba
Mahmood (University of California, Berkeley)
203.
Mark Juergensmeyer
(University of California, Santa Barbara)
204.
Lucas Swaine
(Dartmouth
College)
205.
Charles Butterworth
(University of
Maryland)
206.
Carole Pateman
(Cardiff
University)
207.
Amrita Basu
(Amherst
College)
208.
Fawaz Gerges
(Sarah
Lawrence College)
209.
Yong-Bock Kim
(Asia
Pacific Graduate School for Integral Study of Life)
210.
Ann Norton (University of Pennsylvania)
211.
Cecelia Lynch
(University of California, Irvine)
212.
Susan Buck-Morss
(Cornell
University)
213.
Aristide Zolberg (New
School
University)
214.
Craig Calhoun
(President, Social Science Research Council)
215.
Hagit
Borer (University
of Southern
California)
216.
Dennis
J. Schmidt (Penn
State University)
217.
John
Ralston Saul (author, Canada)
218.
Corey Brettschneider
(Brown
University)
219.
Timur Kuran
(Duke
University)
220.
Paul Chambers
(University of
Glamgoran)
221.
Robert R. Williams
(University of Illinois at Chicago)
222.
Nicholas Xenos
(University of Massachusetts, Amherst)
223.
W. D. Hart
(University of Illinois at Chicago)
224.
Louise
Antony (University of Massachusetts, Amherst)
225.
Rama
Mantena (University of Illinois at Chicago)
226.
Judith Tucker
(Georgetown
University)
227.
Sam Black (Simon Fraser University)
228.
Genevieve Fuji Johnson (Simon Fraser
University)
229.
Shelley Deane
(Bowdoin
College)
230.
Craig
Campbell (St. Edward's University)
231.
Samer Shehata
(Georgetown
University)
232.
Mona
El-Ghobashy (Barnard College)
233.
Jacque Steubbel
(University of the South School of Theology)
234.
David Mednicoff
(University
of Massachusetts, Amherst)
235.
Zeynep
Arikanli (Institute of Political Studies, Aix-en-Provence, France)
236.
R.
E. Jennings (Simon
Fraser University)
237.
Walid
Moubarak (Lebanese
American University)
238.
Nicola
Pratt (University of East
Anglia, UK)
239.
Ulrika
Mĺrtensson (The Norwegian University of Science &
Technology)
240.
Jillian
Schwedler (University of Massachusetts, Amherst)
241.
Robert
D. Lee (Colorado
College)
242.
Alice
Amsden (MIT)
243.
Stephen Van Evera
(MIT)
244.
Joanne Rappaport
(Georgetown
University)
245.
Douglas Allen
(University of
Maine)
246.
Sharon
Stanton Russell (MIT)
247.
Matthew
Gutmann (Brown
University)
248.
Louis
Cantori (University of Maryland)
249.
Catherine Lutz
(Brown
University)
250.
Azzedine Layachi
(St. John's
University)
251.
Katarzyna
Jarecka (Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland)
252.
H.
C. Erik Midelfort (University of Virginia)
253.
Edmund
Burke, III (University of
California, Santa
Cruz)
254.
Michael
Urban (University of California, Santa Cruz)
255.
Susan
Moeller (University of Maryland)
256.
Laurie J. Sears
(University of
Washington)
257.
Margaret Levi
(University of
Washington)
258.
Ebrahim Moosa
(Duke
University)
259.
Robert Ware
(University of
Calgary)
260.
John Entelis
(Fordham
University)
261.
Juan Linz (Yale University)
262.
Malise Ruthven
(writer, Scotland)
263.
Charles Derber
(Boston
College)
264.
Matthew
Evangelista (Cornell University)
265.
Adam
Michnik (writer, Poland)
266.
Norman
Birbaum (Georgetown University)
267.
Hamza
Yusuf (Zaytuna Institute)
268.
Carol
Gould (Temple
University)
269.
Nubar Hovsepian
(Chapman
University)
270.
Colin Rowat
(University of
Birmingham)
271.
Bettina Aotheker
(University of California, Santa Cruz)
272.
Jan Nederveen Pieterse
(University of
Illinois)
273.
Udo
Schuklenk (Queen's University)
274.
Alistair M. Macleod
(Queen's University)
275.
Nancy Gallagher
(University of California, Santa Barbara)
276.
Jamie Mayerfeld
(University of
Washington)
277.
William A. Gamson
(Boston
College)
278.
Michael Goldman
(University of
Minnesota)
279.
Jan Aart Scholte
(University of
Warwick)
280.
Koen Koch
(Leiden University, The Netherlands)
281.
Morton Winston
(College of
New Jersey)
282.
Michael Perry
(Emory
University)
283.
Tony Smith (Tuft University)
284.
W. Richard Bond
(Brock
University)
285.
Adrie
Kusserow (St. Michael's College)
286.
Nissim Mannathukkaren
(Dalhousie
University)
287.
Justin
Tiwald (San
Francisco State
University)
288.
Ásta
Sveinsdóttir (San
Francisco State
University)
289.
Feyzi
Baban (Trent
University)
290.
Elzbieta Matynia (New
School
University)
291.
Beverley
Milton-Edwards (Queens University Belfast)
292.
Awad Halabi
(Wright
State University)
293.
Arthur Goldschmidt
(Penn
State University)
294.
Peter
Railton (University of Michigan)
295.
Naomi Klein (author,
Canada)
296.
Paul Aarts (University of Amsterdam)
297.
Thomas Mertes (UCLA)
298.
Samuel C. Rickless
(University of California, San Diego)
299.
Emran Qureshi
(Harvard
University)
300.
Donald Rutherford
(University of California, San Diego)
301.
Terry Eagleton
(University of
Manchester)
302.
Mujeeb Khan
(University of
California,
Berkeley)
... Payvand News - 9/26/07 ...
