‘Mofsede fel-Arz’
Imprisoned Baha'i leaders: Mrs. Fariba Kamalabadi, Mr. Jamaloddin Khanjani, Mr. Afif Naeimi, Mr. Saeid Rezaie, Mrs. Mahvash Sabet, Mr. Behrouz Tavakkoli, and Mr. Vahid Tizfahm
Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of the arrest of the Yaran (‘Friends of Iran’), the group of seven Baha’i leaders still imprisoned in Iran. Despite earlier accusations by Tehran’s Deputy Prosecutor that they would be charged with espionage for Israel, among other absurd claims, formal charges still have not been registered. The Yaran have also been prevented from meeting with their lawyer, Shirin Ebadi.
And now, their families have been told that the Yaran may be charged with ‘Mofsede fel-Arz’ — ‘spreading corruption on earth’. This is the type of opaque and arbitrary accusation that Iran’s paranoid elite uses to isolate undesirable elements, without really having to explain why. What counts as ‘corruption’? How does one ‘spread’ it — all over the earth?
Sadly, these questions have obscure answers in Iran’s Shia jurisprudence. And somehow, through a tangle of prejudice, logic, and tradition, these answers can be used to sentence to death (that’s the penalty) seven innocent men and women. The Yaran has operated with the full knowledge of all levels of Iranian government for years — serving as an informal body to coordinate the bare essentials of a national religious community that is the largest non-Muslim religious minority in Iran. These men and women saw their elected predecessors (members of the now-banned National Spiritual Assemblies) abducted and executed under the same charges of ‘Mofsede fel-Arz’ during the early 1980s.
What, exactly, does Iran think it is doing? The media has been hailing the possibility for a diplomatic opening with the United States, and the peace process in Israel appears to be starting again. Iran finally freed American journalist Roxana Seberi. But Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has the temerity to stand before the UN Conference on Racism in Durban to castigate states for their lack of respect for justice and human dignity — when this is how Iran treats its own, innocent, citizens?
Bani Dugal, the representative of the Baha’i International Community to the United Nations, posed the question that every government and fair-minded citizen should be asking:
How can the calls of the Iranian leadership for justice in the international sphere be taken seriously if they do not grant justice to their own citizens? In Iran, by all accounts universally agreed upon human rights are routinely ignored, not only for Baha’is but also for women, journalists, and others who only seek dignity and justice.
We should be outraged.
**Profiles of the Yaran can be found here.**
