officials, thus suggesting that due process in Iran is threatened and the independence and
neutrality of the Judiciary is questionable.7
Although the CCP guarantees the right to free legal assistance for those without adequate
financial resources, the applicability of this right is different in the pre-trial and trial phases.8 The
CCP ensures access to free legal assistance during the investigation phase in cases where the
accused faces charges other than those punishable by severe punishments, such as the death
penalty or life imprisonment. However, in May 2019, the Iranian legal and judicial parliamentary
commission proposed an amendment to Article 48 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, which
would allow the prosecution to delay access to a lawyer for 20 days, with a possibility of
extending such delay to the whole duration of the investigation, in cases related to national
security, terrorism or financial corruption.9 10 Such amendment would further restrict access to
legal counsel during the phase of investigation.
Despite the existence of several mechanisms that ostensibly accept complaints regarding
violations of citizens' rights, such as the Parliament’s Article 90 Commission (established under
Article 90 of the Constitution, offering a mechanism to citizens to file complaint against any of
the three branches of power) and the Oversight Bodies for the exercise of Citizenship Rights in
the country's provincial courts, there is no evidence to suggest that complaints to these bodies are
independently reviewed and investigated.11
In its 2019 Report to the Universal Periodic Review, the Islamic Republic of Iran stated that it
adopted measures including “providing access to a lawyer and benefiting from legal advice” and
added that “in the agreement with the centre of lawyers and legal advisers of the Judiciary and a
number of bar associations, free judicial assistance is provided to prisoners” and that “social and
judicial assistance units also provide legal counsel to prisoners.”12
However, individuals accused of committing crimes against national security, including those
that might be sentenced to the death penalty, are often denied access to a lawyer during the
investigative stage of the judicial process. Of the hundreds of cases that the Abdorrahman
Boroumand Centre has investigated of individuals arrested for political reasons, or suspected of
committing ordinary crimes, none of the individuals were interrogated with the presence of an
7
“Iranian Lawyers Criticize Proposal to Deprive Defendants of Right to Choose Counsel,” Human Rights Activists in Iran, June
6, 2018 (https://www.iranrights.org/library/document/3443)
8
Amnesty International, https://www.amnesty.org/download/Documents/MDE1327082016ENGLISH.PDF
9
Abdorrahman Boroumand Center, https://www.iranrights.org/newsletter/issue/99
10
Amnesty International, www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde13/0379/2019/en/ ;
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2019/05/iran-proposed-law-restricting-access-to-lawyer-would-be-crushing-blow-forjustice/
11
Joint submission to the Human Rights Committee, Abdorrahman Center, Iran Human Rights Documentation Center (IHRDC),
Impact Iran and Human Rights Activists in Iran, 2020,
https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/15/treatybodyexternal/Download.aspx?symbolno=INT%2fCCPR%2fICS%2fIRN%2f42313
&Lang=en
12
National Report, UPR 2019, Islamic Republic of Iran, https://undocs.org/A/HRC/WG.6/34/IRN/1
2