Iran has stepped up its actions in opposition to Baha’i residents, arresting 12 believers accused by Tehran of being “heretics” and having hyperlinks to Israel in a unbroken crackdown that has been condemned by Iranian and international rights teams.
Iranian state media on September 4 mentioned the arrests happened in several cities in Mazandaran Province, the identical space the place 14 members of Iran’s largest non-Muslim non secular minority had been arrested on August 31.
Baha’is — who quantity some 300,000 in Iran and have an estimated 5 million followers worldwide — say they face systematic persecution in Iran, the place their religion will not be formally acknowledged within the structure.
On a number of events, Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has known as the Baha’i religion a cult and in a non secular fatwa issued in 2018 forbade contact, together with enterprise dealings, with followers of the faith.
Because the Islamic Republic of Iran was established in 1979, a whole lot of Baha’is have been arrested and jailed for his or her beliefs. At the least 200 have been executed or had been arrested and by no means heard from once more.
Members have rejected allegations of Iranian authorities and say members in Iran are dedicated to working for the nice of the nation.
In an interview with RFE/RL’s Radio Farda, Simin Fahandej, the spokeswoman for the Worldwide Baha’i Group in Geneva, mentioned the Iranian authorities is growing strain on Baha’is, together with
the issuance of stiff jail sentences in opposition to them, as a part of a “new wave of persecution.”
Shi’ite Islam is the state faith in Iran, however the authorities acknowledges minority faiths, together with Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism, however not Bahaism.
