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CONGRESS OF IRANIAN NATIONALITIES FOR A
FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF IRAN
B.P.102 – 7623 Paris
Cedex 13 – France
September 14, 2005
Join us in a demonstration in front of the
United Nations Headquarters in
New York City to protest the visit of Iranian
president Mahmood Ahmadinejad
Assembly point: 47th Street
& 2nd Ave on Wednesday September 14, 2005
from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM
We, the Congress of Iranian Nationalities for a
Federal Republic of Iran are assembled here to protest the scheduled
address of Iranian President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Mahmood
Ahmadinejad to the 6th session of the United Nations
General Assembly. We find this event to be shocking, given that
President Ahmadinejad is implicated in the assassination of Dr.
Ghassamlou, the General Secretary of the Democratic Party of Iranian
Kurdistan and the assassinations of Dr. Kazem Sami and Parviz Douani,
all of whom were opposition leaders against the Iranian government.
Shortly before President Ahmadinejad’s inauguration
on August 3, 2005, he signaled to the international community his
position on minority rights in Iran—130 indigenous Ahwazi Arabs in
Khuzestan (al-Ahwaz), that were peacefully demonstrating against their
living conditions were massacred. President Ahmadinejad also ordered
the killings of Kurds in the cities of Mahabad, Sghez, Eshnowieh,
where they were gunned down by Iranian security forces. Many Balochi
freedom fighters were also executed in cities throughout Baluchestan.
Currently, non-Persian provinces that are dominated by minorities are
cordoned off and under the Iranian military control. Foreign
journalists and neutral observers are forbidden entrance to these
areas.
Iran enforces a systemic apartheid within its
borders of all that does not comply with the government’s beliefs and
practices. People are neither permitted to speak their native
language nor to practice their faiths, customs and traditions in
public for fear they will be arrested or worse. The Iranian
government and military earn billions of petrodollars, but do not
share the oil revenue with the Ahwazi Arabs, whose homeland is located
in Khuzestan (al-Ahwaz), a region that produces 90% of Iran’s oil.
This example is only one of many that demonstrate how minorities are
forced to live in deplorable conditions and earn meager wages.
Furthermore, women in the ethnic, national or religious minority
groups experience a double-minority stigma.
We represent the oppressed, ethnic, national, and
religious minorities in Iran, namely Iranians, Turks, Kurds, Arabs,
Balochis, Turkomen, Jews, Assyrians, and Bihais. Contrary to the
Islamic Republic’s claim that Iran is a homogenous “Persian Nation”,
it is a multi-cultural, multi-lingual and multi-ethnic society. Iran
consists of six major ethnic groups—Persians, Turks, Arabs, Kurds,
Balochis and Turkomen. Iran’s population is approximately sixty-eight
million, with an estimated 1/3 Persian. For the past eighty years,
minorities have suffered through 80 years of Persia’s ruthless and
discriminatory government.
We call upon the United Nations and the
international community to condemn Iran’s human rights violations of
its people and we advocate for a federalist approach
in Iran. This approach would help to secure democracy and human
rights for all minorities. In smaller political units, individual
Iranians could participate more directly in a monolithic unitary
government. Moreover, individuals dissatisfied with conditions in one
community have the option of moving to another that would be protected
and secured by a federal system.
Iran’s future as a federalist state will be
guaranteed only through a pluralistic and democratic society. We
plead for the international community to support that the inherent
rights to freedom and dignity be given to all Iranian citizens. The
voices and rights of all Iranians should not be made tangential or
denied in society by those who would seek to marginalize certain
minorities. Iranians need the support of the United Nations and the
support of all its freedom-loving members that respect human rights,
and who demand equality and justice for all Iranians regardless of
gender, ethnicity and religious beliefs.
Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan
Ahwaz Democratic Solidarity Party
Baluch United Front
Baluch Peoples Party
Azeri International Institute
Organization to Defend the Rights of Turkmen Nation
Kumeleh Revolutionary Party of Iranian Kurdistan |
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