[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 180 (Thursday, December 5, 2024)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6850-S6851]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SA 3312. Mr. WYDEN proposed an amendment to the resolution S. Res.
74, condemning the Government of Iran's state-sponsored persecution of
the Baha'i minority and its continued violation of the International
Covenants on Human Rights; as follows:
Strike the preamble and insert the following:
Whereas, in 1982, 1984, 1988, 1990, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1996,
2000, 2004, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017,
2018, 2020, and 2022, Congress declared that it deplored the
religious persecution by the Government of Iran of the Baha'i
community and would hold the Government of Iran responsible
for upholding the rights of all Iranian nationals, including
members of the Baha'i faith;
Whereas, since 1979, Iranian authorities have killed or
executed more than 200 Baha'i leaders and more than 10,000
Baha'is have been dismissed from government and university
jobs;
Whereas June 18, 2023, marked the 40th anniversary of the
execution of 10 Baha'i women by the Government of Iran, each
witnessing the hanging of those hanged before her in a final
failed attempt to induce abandonment of their faith after
over 6 months of imprisonment and violent abuse, with the
youngest only 17 years old;
Whereas, on December 19, 2023, the United Nations General
Assembly adopted a resolution (A/C.3/78/L.41) calling on Iran
to carry out wide-ranging reforms and expressing serious
concerns for its escalating human rights abuses, including--
(1) ``severe limitations and increasing restrictions on the
right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, or
belief'';
(2) ``restrictions on the establishment of places of
worship, undue restrictions on burials carried out in
accordance with religious tenets, attacks against places of
worship and burial'';
(3) ``increased harassment, intimidation, persecution,
arbitrary arrest, and detention of, and incitement to hatred
that leads to violence against, persons belonging to
recognized and unrecognized religious minorities, including
Christians (particularly converts from Islam), Gonabadi
Dervishes, Jews, Sufi Muslims, Sunni Muslims, Yarsanis,
Zoroastrians, and in particular, Baha'is'';
(4) ``denial of and restrictions on access to education,
including for members of the Baha'i faith''; and
(5) ``particular'' persecution of members of the Baha'i
community ``who have been subjected to a continued increase
in persecution, including attacks, harassment and targeting.
. .on account of their faith and have been reportedly
subjected to mass arrests and lengthy prison sentences, as
well as the arrest of prominent members and increased
confiscation and destruction of property'';
Whereas, in the 2024 Annual Report of the United States
Commission on International Religious Freedom issued in May
2024, it is reported that in 2023--
(1) the Government of Iran ``conducted individual and mass
arrests of Baha'is across Iran taking them to undisclosed
locations and imposing excessively long prison sentences'';
(2) ``security officials beat and brutalized Baha'is during
raids and searches of private homes'';
(3) ``security forces arrested scores of Baha'is in cities
including Hamadan, Mehrshahr, Yazd, Karaj, Alborz, and
Tehran'';
(4) the ``government has targeted Baha'i women in
particular'' and that ``[a]pproximately two-thirds of Iranian
Baha'i prisoners are women'';
(5) authorities ``targeted Baha'i cemeteries in Arak,
Alborz, and Golestan''; and
(6) local ``municipalities seized and confiscated Baha'i
land, restricted Baha'i access to burial grounds, and
declared intentions to sell Baha'i-owned property exclusively
to Muslims.'';
Whereas the Iran section of the Department of State's 2022
Report on International Religious Freedom issued in May 2023
provides, in part--
(1) ``[I]n July and August, security forces in cities
across the country conducted multiple raids of Baha'i homes,
confiscated property deemed `illegitimate wealth', and
arrested Baha'is in their homes or workplaces on
unsubstantiated charges including `causing intellectual and
ideological insecurity in Muslim society.' '';
(2) ``Authorities reportedly continued to deny members of
unrecognized religious minority groups access to education
and government employment unless they declared themselves as
belonging to one of the country's recognized religions on
their application forms. UN experts reported universities
rejected more than 90 Baha'i students between January and
August.''; and
(3) ``Government officials and government-affiliated
organizations continued to disseminate anti-Baha'i and
antisemitic messages using traditional and social media.'';
Whereas, in response to a surge in persecution in June and
July 2022, involving the subjection of over 100 Baha'is to
arrests, arraignments, sentencing, and raids on their homes
and businesses across Iran, including the sentencing in June
of 26 individuals in the city of Shiraz to a combined total
of 85 years in prison, the Department of State's Office of
International Religious Freedom issued a statement on August
2, 2022, indicating that ``[a]mid a continued rise in
arrests, sentences, and imprisonments, the U.S. urges Iran to
halt its ongoing oppression of the Baha'i community and honor
its international obligations to respect the right of all
Iranians to freedom of religion or belief'';
Whereas, on November 21, 2022, Mahvash Sabet and Fariba
Kamalabadi, 2 former members of the informal 7-person
leadership group of the Baha'is of Iran, who each served 10-
year sentences from 2008 to 2018, and have been detained
since July 31, 2022, in Evin prison, were sentenced to 10
years in prison each after a summary trial lasting 1 hour;
Whereas, on December 11, 2022, the Baha'i International
Community organization stated that ``Dr. Shirin Ebadi, the
Nobel laureate and defence lawyer for Mahvash and Fariba
during their first trial, said in 2008 that `not a shred of
evidence' was offered to prove the national security charges
or other allegations. Nor was any new evidence forthcoming at
this latest trial'';
Whereas, on January 12, 2024, the Baha'i International
Community organization reported increasing incidents of
persecution accompanied by intensified violence perpetrated
against the Baha'i community by the Government of Iran, for
example--
(1) ``since the beginning of October [2023] more than 200
incidents of persecution, including over 50 arrests and
imprisonments, have occurred in various cities such as
Shiraz, Yazd, Isfahan, Hamadan, and Karaj'';
(2) government agents have perpetrated ``increasingly
violent home raids, disproportionately affecting women and
the elderly, and have even resulted in hospitalizations and
traumatic separations of mothers from their children.
Notably, over two-thirds of those arrested and detained have
been women, predominantly in their twenties and thirties,
highlighting the escalation of attacks against women in
recent months.''; and
(3) government agents have instigated a ``conspicuous rise
in hate speech, where Baha'is have been accused of being
behind the September 2022 protests, promoting permissiveness,
being against Islam and Shiism, being spies for Israel and
the West, and being part of a political movement that seeks
to undermine the state'';
Whereas Iran is a member of the United Nations and a
signatory to both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
among other international human rights treaties, without
reservation;
Whereas section 105 of the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions,
Accountability, and Divestment Act of 2010 (22 U.S.C. 8514)
authorizes the President to impose sanctions on individuals
who are ``responsible for or complicit in, or responsible for
ordering, controlling, or otherwise directing, the commission
of serious human rights abuses against citizens of
[[Page S6851]]
Iran or their family members on or after June 12, 2009''; and
Whereas the Iran Threat Reduction and Syria Human Rights
Act of 2012 (Public Law 112-158) amends and expands the
authorities established under the Comprehensive Iran
Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act of 2010 (Public
Law 111-195) to sanction Iranian human rights abusers: Now,
therefore, be it
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