TEHRAN— Following the submission of a report about human rights situation in Iran by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Thursday, Iran’s High Council for Human Rights released a statement on Tuesday calling the UN interim report a “non-reflection of the country’s human rights developments and achievements.”

The statement said granting the mandate of compiling a country-specific report to the secretary-general on human rights, while there is an international expert mechanism in this regard, is basically “unreasonable and illogical as well as both unnecessary and unprofessional.”

In his report, Guterres claimed that Iran has used coercive measures against dissidents. 

The following is the statement issued by the Iranian High Council for Human Rights:

“According to resolution A/RES/76/178 of the General Assembly, the Secretary-General of the United Nations is required to prepare an interim report on the human rights situation of the Islamic Republic of Iran and submit it to the 50th session of the UN Human Rights Council. However, the previous responses of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the Secretary-General's reports have emphasized that such resolutions are politically motivated, biased and unfair, and have not been drafted on the basis of a promotional approach to human rights, which is one of the main tasks of international human rights institutions and without the consent of Member States.

Granting the mandate of compiling a country-specific report to the Secretary-General on human rights, while there is an international expert mechanism in this regard, is basically unreasonable and illogical as well as both unnecessary and unprofessional.

The Islamic Republic of Iran reiterates the principled objection that while in the preparation of such detailed and time-consuming reports, no prior consultation is made with country, only a week is given to review and respond to and comment on allegations enumerated therein. This indicates the adoption of a political approach in compiling such reports in which the views of the country concerned have no place.

The Islamic Republic of Iran, in response to the previous reports of the Secretary-General and the Special Rapporteur, has provided detailed and reasoned opinions and arguments regarding each paragraph and the allegations made in those reports, but unfortunately, the authors of the reports have been inattentive to the information and opinions of the Islamic Republic of Iran as they were minimally reflected in the final version of the previous reports. It seems that not only there is no will to pay attention to the opinions and consequently to modify the report based on correct and reliable sources, but also there is an insistence to repeat unsubstantiated claims and cite false or invalid sources. In fact, the main text of the report is mainly based on the allegations and accusations made by anti-establishment and dissident groups.

Another noteworthy point in the report and other reports prepared and presented on the situation of human rights situation in the Islamic Republic of Iran is non-reflection of the country’s human rights developments and achievements. While the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran is constantly devoting all its efforts to promoting and protecting the human rights of its citizens and significant progress and achievements have been made in this regard, but such positive cases have either not been reflected completely or if reflected, they are presented with misleading analysis and biased interpretations.

It should also be noted that, unfortunately, out of more than 100 sources mentioned in the footnotes of the report, only 20 cases have cited internal sources which of course in such cases, the facts have been clearly distorted by misinterpreting the cited news. The rest of the sources and references have been made based upon anti-Iran foreign and dissident media outlets’ propaganda. This indicates the politicized approach of the authors of the report on the one hand, and the lack of credible, documented and accurate sources on the other.

The death sentence is issued in accordance with legal standards only for the most serious crimes and in full compliance with Paragraph 2, Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The main part of the death penalty is premeditated murder and retribution-in-kind. Of course, in this case, the practice of the judicial system is to try to seek pardon from the victim’s next-of-kin.

The recent media hype using the code name of “deaths in state custody” comes from unsubstantiated and groundless fabrications made by certain media outlets affiliated to governments hostile to the Islamic Republic of Iran. Investigations into the names of allegedly deceased persons in a so called NGO, and the response to inquiries from the relevant authorities, show that some of the names do not exist at all. Only a few of those listed, all of whom were either armed smugglers or members of terrorist groups, were killed during armed clashes with police or border guards. These individuals have as a matter of fact never been in police custody.

Some of the names refer to those who died of disease while receiving medical treatment outside prison. The assessments produced following autopsy along with the results of lab tests are emblematic of the fact that the above named had never been mistreated. A number of these individuals have died of drug poisoning and abuse, with some of them committing suicide. What is ridiculously interesting is the mentioning of individuals who are either released or imprisoned and alive as those who lost their lives in custody.

However, in any case where a prisoner loses life thereof during sentence, investigations will be carried out and if it is proven that the prison authorities are at fault or have been negligent, a lawsuit will be filed and the offender or offenders will be prosecuted.

The lack international human rights documents’ failure to pay attention to the cultural diversity of countries is the biggest problem which, if ignored, deprives countries of their human rights in freedom of thought and opinion and violate the purpose of promoting human rights in the world.

No one is prosecuted in Iran for merely holding an opinion or belonging to a particular class or group. At the same time, anyone breaking laws will not be tolerated due to affiliation thereof with a particular group. Therefore, titles such as civil society activists, human rights defenders, minority rights activists or any other title cannot be served as a basis for persecution or circumvention of laws.

Judiciary-licensed lawyers and 57,000 lawyers admitted to the bar) are freely practicing law in the country. Legal action against a few of them has not been for the practice of law; rather, for having committed corpus criminal enterprises not associated with their profession.

The Law on Youthful Population and Family Protection has been ratified on the strength of Article 10 of the Constitution and by virtue of the Law on the Sixth Five-Year Economic, Cultural and Social Development Plan, with the aim of protecting the family and preventing dangerous medical, psychological, cultural and social complications of abortion and addressing concerns about population decline. A great part of this plan is dedicated to providing incentive items such as livelihood, welfare and housing facilities, insurance support for infertile couples, proper culture building and facilities for housewives and working mothers; it is under no circumstances whatsoever in conflict with personal life, privacy and reproductive health of citizens.

Staging gatherings and rallies and attending assemblies is an undeniable right of citizens, which has been recognized in Article 27 of the Constitution and other regulations in effect in the Islamic Republic of Iran, including in Articles 43 and 46 of the Citizen’s charter (enacted in 2016). Organization of hundreds of assemblies, gatherings and protest rallies a year in the country (in some cases even unauthorized) is indicative of the recognition of this civil right and the establishment heeding public demands.

The principled policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran is the management of rallies with tolerance and restraint as long as it is peaceful. But if some participants in the rallies want to turn it into violence and disturb public order, it is the duty of the officers to establish order, prevent violence against the people and fend off destruction of public and private property. Police exercised maximum restraint in response to riots by giving a non-violent response. The police however might be forced to brandish weapons, in full observance of the Law on the Use of Firearms, in response to terrorist-backed armed thugs who had sought to cause and fuel unrest by using combat and hunting arms as well as shotguns.

It is deeply regrettable that while the present draft report and similar reports defend criminals and terrorists, and sometimes portray them as human rights activists, they are unable to condemn the martyrdom of more than 40 law enforcement officers, most of whom lost their lives in the face of armed drug traffickers or terrorist groups. As long as such an approach is governed by international mechanisms and human rights, human rights will not be promoted and the place of the victim will be replaced by the criminal.

Politicization of human rights by the Secretary General amounts to the violation of the most fundamental and most evident statutory and legal principles, including the principle of equality before law and the principle of non-discrimination. This report has an independent section on “foreign nationals and dual nationals”. Double nationality is not recognized by the Islamic Republic of Iran. Having double nationality neither gives any privilege nor does it deny any citizen right. Pursuant to the laws in effect in the Islamic Republic of Iran, all persons referred to in this report are recognized as Iranian and they will be dealt with based upon the rules and regulations in effect in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The serious question here is to know why some foreign states are using some Iranian nationals with double nationality and even their own nationals in actions running counter to Iran’s national security. Justice is applied to all convicts and nationality does not deny due process of law. The question which remains open is to know why the Secretary-General has not mentioned Iranians held in detention abroad. It is recalled that more than 4,000 Iranians are currently held in prisons in the United States and other countries, nearly 40 of whom on charges of seeking to circumvent sanctions.

Unfortunately, despite the existence of some paragraphs appertaining to sanctions in the Secretary-General’s report, there is no trace of the negative impacts of sanctions therein. The Secretary-General should have explicitly pointed out the negative impacts of unilateral coercive measures on the human rights of the Iranian people and various rights thereof and called on the orchestrators to lift the sanctions. The Islamic Republic of Iran refers the Secretary-General to the remarks of the Special Rapporteur on the Negative Impact of Unilateral Coercive Measures on the Enjoyment of Human Rights who recently visited Iran.

The draft report does not mention the responsibility of the orchestrators and perpetrators of sanctions. It has also refrained from describing the imposition of negative, destructive, damaging and deadly impacts of cruel and criminal unilateral coercive measures against the human rights of the Iranian people by the U.S. regime and international responsibility thereof. The Secretary-General of the United Nations was expected to first condemn the imposition of unilateral coercive measures, and call for the lifting of all such sanctions. The report has also ignored the provisional order issued by the International Court of Justice in 2018 appertaining to the alleged violations of the 1955 Treaty of Amity, Economic Relations and Consular Rights (Islamic Republic of Iran v. the United States of America).

The Islamic Republic of Iran has nevertheless pursued a policy of interaction and cooperation with international mechanisms. A signatory to international human rights conventions and treaties galore, the Islamic Republic of Iran – in order to fulfill commitment thereof – has submitted the following periodic reports to treaty institutions over the past 18 months including the Preliminary Report on the Implementation of the Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography, Fourth Periodic Report on the Implementation of Obligations Under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, The Fourteenth Periodic Report on the Implementation of Obligations Under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, Finalizing the Fifth and Sixth Reports on the Implementation of Obligations Under the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Preparing the Second, Third and Fourth Combined Reports on the Implementation of Obligations Under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.”