The UN, Twitter, & You: Recent Developments in Iran

By Pam Shime and Ali Bangi

Pam Shime is the Founding Director of the Global Advocacy & Leadership Institute (GALI) and Ali Bangi is the Director of Campaign (Cycling) for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI). 

Imprisoned in Iran for participating in last June‘s peaceful anti-government protests, 24 year-old Ibrahim Sharifi spent four days in a crowded cell, handcuffed and blindfolded, while being beaten to the point of vomiting blood. On the fourth day, two guards took him to a room and, while laughing and mocking him, sexually assaulted him to the point of unconsciousness. Fearing he would die in custody, they then left him by the side of a highway in Tehran.

Mr. Sharifi was in hiding in Turkey when he spoke to reporters in September 2009. After his family was threatened as a result of his telling his story, Mr. Sharifi fled Iran. He is one of the few who have spoken openly about sexual assault of protesters in prison, though rights groups believe his case is one of many on the basis of numerous reports by people unwilling to go public. Human Rights Watch has confirmed the credibility of Mr. Sharifi‘s account.

The charges of rape and sodomy of imprisoned protesters such as Mr. Sharifi, brought to light by opposition leader Mehdi Karroubi, shook the regime. Even government supporters have responded with shock to these methods of torture. A government judicial investigating committee rushed to reject the validity of the documents supporting accounts of rape and other abuse in prison. Mr. Sharifi continues to fear for his life, even in Turkey.

The timing, then, could not be better for an international review of human rights in Iran. On February 15, 2010, in Geneva, the UN Human Rights Council heard from Iran in its Seventh Session of the Universal Periodic Review. As part of Iran‘s presentation, Mahmoud Abbaszadeh Meshkini, Director General of the Ministry of the Interior, conceded that there were some "minor illegal actions" taken against detained protesters last year. Other representatives of Iran, including Deputy Minister of Justice Judge Seyed Ali Raeis Sadati, extolled the independence of the judiciary, the "reasonable conditions" in the prison system, and the fairness of the elections. In June, the Council will consider the outcome of the review. The Iran Human Rights Documentation Center has condemned the presentation of the delegation and "urges the international community to not accept the delegation‘s representations. At the very least, United Nations human rights experts must immediately investigate Iran‘s prisons, including allegations of rape, torture, and the detention of people for peacefully exercising their rights to freedoms of expression and assembly."

The majority of the victims of the rape, torture, and detention of protesters by Iran have been young people. 70% of Iran‘s population is, like Mr. Sharifi, under 30 — a result of the then-new, post-Shah Islamic government encouraging Iranian couples in the early 1980s to bear more children. The irony of these young people turning on the government cannot be lost on those in power. However, those in power have other concerns as well. There are cracks at the highest level of the power structure in Iran today, something that distinguishes this disruptive moment from earlier ones. Furthermore, despite extensive knowledge of the vicious torture of anti-government protesters in prisons across Iran, opposition to the government continues to be expressed in different forms.

The age of the majority of the protesters in Iran has meant that much of the democracy movement has taken place via new technology and social networking tools — cell phones, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Cell phones and the internet are essential elements of communication among protesters and from them to the outside world.

This is why the pervasive use of technology and internet blocking by the Iranian government is of significant concern. Since June, in addition to censoring the media, arresting 65 Iranian journalists, and expelling foreign journalists from the country, the government has also cut off cell phone services and access to the internet.

In June 2009, 16 days after the contested elections, Iran's Cyberspace Criminal Law came into effect. The law criminalizes the use of circumvention tools to bypass internet filters put in place by the government, as well as accessing banned web-sites, among other acts. Affected websites include Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Skype, Human Rights Watch, The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, The Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, Iranian opposition groups and online newspapers, among many others. Anyone convicted of violating this law can be imprisoned for up to two years.

Circumvention tools, referred to as "filter breakers" in Iran, allow users access to blocked (or filtered) websites. These tools are very popular in Iran and young people there are often among the first to use new circumvention products and technologies, including Psiphon, a censorship circumvention software created by the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. According to Patrick Lin, who offers a circumvention technology called Puff, 40% of Puff‘s daily users are in Iran.

Time will tell whether this relatively young law will facilitate even further repression of young protesters. Young people continue to defy government sanctions, censorship and repression, much like their predecessors in South Africa and South Korea in the 1980s, who helped lead their countries into a new era of democracy. They continue, despite internet blocking, to get the word out about the unfolding movement in Iran. They appear fearless in the face of unimaginable state brutality.

Students around the world are now organizing to support those risking their lives in Iran. With support from students on campuses across Canada and beyond, we believe we could see a global student movement for democracy in Iran in alliance with the protesters inside the country. Such a movement could build on the example and success of the student movement outside and inside South Africa that mobilized the world against the apartheid regime and ultimately was a key player in its downfall. Over many years, Iranians inside and outside Iran have developed strong networks and international reputations that could play an important role in such a movement.

We will leave the last word to Mr. Sharifi, whose stunningly brave response at the age of 24 to his nightmarish experience a prison in Tehran makes him a worthy inspiration for us all. "I think they are following me to kill me," he said recently, "But I will not let them force me into silence."