Below is an extract from a written statement submitted to the Fourth Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) by the International Federation for the Protection of the Rights of Ethnic, Religious, Linguistic and Other Minorities (IFPRERLOM) in March 2007. It condemns the summary executions of several Ahwazi.

With reference to the mandates and mechanisms of the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), this written statement wishes to bring to the attention of the HRC current cases of grave human rights violations committed against indigenous peoples, minorities and other marginalised groups in Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

IFPRERLOM welcomes the joint statement issued by UN Human Rights Council's experts on extrajudicial executions, independence of judges and lawyers and torture on 10 January 2007, which urged the Iranian Government to "stop the imminent execution of seven men belonging to the Ahwazi Arab minority and grant them a fair and public hearing". The announcement on 9 November 2006 by Iran’s Supreme Court of the death sentences of several Ahwazi Arabs following one-day trials in absence of lawyers and witnesses, prompted international outrage and condemnation. The European Parliament in its 16 November 2006 resolution expressed deep concern about the methods of execution still widespread in Iran, as well as the “absence of guarantees of due process of law and the absence of respect for internationally recognised legal safeguards”. Despite calls on the Iranian Government by UN Independent Experts on Human Rights, the European Parliament, and international human rights organizations to immediately halt their executions, and to reconsider the widespread use of the death penalty as a means of silencing political opposition, four Ahwazi opposition activists were executed on 24 January 2007; Mohammad Chaabpour (28), Abdolamir Farjolah Chaab (26), Alireza Asakereh (24), Khalaf Dohrab Khanafereh (Khazirawi) (34), and an additional three Ahwazi activists, Ghasem Salami (Salamat) (41), Majad Albughbish (30) and Abdolreza Sanawati (Zergani) (34), executed on 14 February 2007.

In the wake of the series of executions, IFPRERLOM is particularly alarmed at the systematic targeting of ethnic Ahwazi Arabs and the fact that the Iranian Judiciary in many of the cases conducts secret trials, depriving defendants of fundamental of legal rights, and appeals to the Human Council to request Iranian authorities to ensure due legal process in accordance with internationally recognized standards to uphold its obligations with regard to civil and political rights, including the provision of equal rights to ethnic, religious and minority groups in Iran, including the Ahwazi, Azerbaijani Turks, Baloch and Kurds.

For the full statement